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Ice-age Ice-sheet Rheology: Constraints from the Last Glacial Maximum Form of the Laurentide Ice SheetState-ot-the-art thermomechanical models of the modern Greenland ice and the ancient Laurenticle ice sheet that covered Canada at the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) are not able to explain simultaneously the observed forms of these cryospheric structures when the same, anisotropy-enhanced, version of the conventional Glen flow law is employed to describe their rheology. The LGM Laurenticle ice sheet. predicted to develop in response to orbital climate forcing, is such that the ratio of its thickness to its horizontal extent is extremely large compared to the aspect ratio inferred on the basis of surface-geomorphological and solid-earth-geophysical constraints. We show that if the Glen flow law representation of the rheology is replaced with a new rheology based upon very high quality laboratory measurements of the stress-strain-rate relation, then the aspect ratios of both the modern Greenland ice sheet and the Laurenticle ice sheet, that existed at the LGM, are simultaneously explained with little or no retuning of the flow law.
Document ID
20020001353
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
Authors
Peltier, W. Richard
(Toronto Univ. Ontario Canada)
Goldsby, David L.
(Minnesota Univ. Minneapolis, MN United States)
Kohlstedt, David L.
(Minnesota Univ. Minneapolis, MN United States)
Tarasov, Lev
(Toronto Univ. Ontario Canada)
Date Acquired
August 20, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 2000
Publication Information
Publication: Annals of Glaciology
Publisher: International Glaciological Society
Volume: 30
Subject Category
Geophysics
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NSERC-A9627
CONTRACT_GRANT: NAG5-4956
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

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