East Antarctica

East Antarctica, also called Greater Antarctica, constitutes the majority (two-thirds) of the Antarctic continent, lying primarily in the Eastern Hemisphere south of the Indian Ocean, and separated from West Antarctica by the Transantarctic Mountains. It is generally greater in elevation than West Antarctica, and includes the Gamburtsev Mountain Range in the center. The geographic South Pole is located within East Antarctica. Apart from small areas of the coast, East Antarctica is permanently covered by ice and it has relatively low biodiversity, with only a small number of species of terrestrial plants, animals, algae, and lichens. The coasts are the breeding ground for various seabirds and penguins, and the leopard seal, Weddell seal, elephant seal, crabeater seal and Ross seal breed on the surrounding pack ice in summer. Location and description Almost completely covered in thick, permanent ice, East Antarctica comprises Coats Land, Queen Maud Land, Enderby Land, Kem

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Evidence of Strong Flux Underestimation by Bulk Parametrizations During Drifting and Blowing Snow

Daniela Brito Melo, Francesco Comola, Jérôme François Sylvain Dujardin, Wolf Hendrik Huwald, Michael Lehning, Koichi Nishimura, Varun Sharma, Armin Sigmund

The influence of drifting and blowing snow on surface mass and energy exchange is difficult to quantify due to limitations in both measurements and models, but is still potentially very important over large areas with seasonal or perennial snow cover. We present a unique set of measurements that make possible the calculation of turbulent moisture, heat, and momentum fluxes during conditions of drifting and blowing snow. From the data, Monin–Obukhov estimation of bulk fluxes is compared to eddy-covariance-derived fluxes. In addition, large-eddy simulations with sublimating particles are used to more completely understand the vertical profiles of the fluxes. For a storm period at the Syowa S17 station in East Antarctica, the bulk parametrization severely underestimates near-surface heat and moisture fluxes. The large-eddy simulations agree with the eddy-covariance fluxes when the measurements are minimally disturbed by the snow particles. We conclude that overall exchange over snow surfaces is much more intense than current models suggest, which has implications for the total mass balance of the Antarctic ice sheet and the cryosphere.

2021

Beyond Point Measurements: Sea Ice Floes Characterized in 3-D

Katherine Colby Leonard, Ernesto Trujillo Gomez

A new methodology for coincident floe-scale measurements of the surface elevation, snow depth, and ice draft (the thickness below the water line) of Antarctic sea ice has been demonstrated during two recent research voyages: the Australian-led Sea Ice Physics and Ecosystem Experiment II (SIPEX II) to East Antarctica in September–November 2012 and the United Kingdom–led Ice Mass Balance in the Bellingshausen Sea (ICEBell) voyage to the Weddell and Bellingshausen Seas in November 2010

2013

Local snow transport and surface evolution processes in East Antarctica

Francesco Comola, Philip Crivelli, Wolf Hendrik Huwald, Michael Lehning, Eric Sauvageat, Varun Sharma, Nander Wever

In Antarctica, direct measurements of processes shaping the surface mass balance such as precipitation, accumulation and erosion, drifting and blowing snow, and sublimation, are sparse and challenging due to the extreme environment and related difficulties in measuring the variables of interest. An ongoing project, ‘Local Surface Mass Balance in East Antarctica’, is designed to address these processes at the local scale with the objective of relating near-surface atmospheric dynamics, drifting and blowing snow, snow properties, and resulting accumulation and erosion patterns. Two snow mass balance stations at Princess Elisabeth, Antarctica, (72S, 23E, 1380m.a.s.l.) are collecting data since December 2016, including standard meteorological instruments, snow particle counters and 3-D sonic anemometers for combined analysis of wind, turbulence and mass flux. Pre- and post-storm Terrestrial Laser Scans (TLS) record the resulting surface morphological changes. This contribution presents analysis and preliminary results of the turbulence and wind data to obtain vertically integrated mass flux estimates. Calculated surface roughness and friction velocities are used for establishing formulations of vertical profiles of drifting and blowing snow. Stability corrections, auto- and cross-correlation functions of wind and mass flux, as well as the lag-time between sonic anemometers and snow particle counters are investigated. It is shown which vertical profile shape leads to consistent mass flux estimates and how magnitudes of calculated mass fluxes compare to earlier estimates. The comparisons suggest that mass transport has rather been underestimated in early and several current studies.

2018

ENV-406: Biomineralization: from nature to application

Understanding process and role of biomineralization (minerals formed by living organisms) in context of Earth's evolution,global chemical cycles, climatic changes and remediation.