Ice sheets and glaciers
Ice sheets and glaciers are major components of the Quaternary environment. Knowledge about glacial history and present glacier activity are therefore essential for our understanding of climate history as well as past and future sea level changes.
Ice sheets and glaciers
Our research is focusing on glacial history on different time scales:
- The build-up and decay of the large scale continental ice sheets that have characterized the Quaternary
- The stability of the Greenland ice sheet
- Local glaciers and how they have responded to climate change up to the present
The research is based on geomorphological mapping and on studies of glacial sediments exposed on land and retrieved from cores in lake basins. We also study glacial erosion and depositional processes. Together with chronological data, the results are used for reconstructions of past glacial environments. Another growing activity is the modeling of glaciers and ice sheets, and how they interact with the atmosphere and ocean on various time scales.
Scandinavian Ice Sheet during Younger Dryas (12ka) Foto/ill.: Richard Gyllencreutz
Simulated surface mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet at the end of the 21st century. Foto/ill.: Andreas Born