Dresden 2011 – wissenschaftliches Programm
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UP: Fachverband Umweltphysik
UP 4: Climate; jointly with Arbeitsgruppe Junge DPG (AGjDPG)
UP 4.3: Vortrag
Mittwoch, 16. März 2011, 15:15–15:45, HSZ 201
Subglacial lakes in Antarctica: Origin, Fate and Relevance — •Malte Thoma1, Sebastian Göller2, Klaus Grosfeld2, and Christoph Mayer1 — 1Bavarian Academy of Sciences, Commission for Glaciology, München, Germany — 2Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Bremerhaven, Germany
One of the most remote and undiscovered regions on Earth are subglacial lakes in Antarctica. More than 300 of these lakes have been identified so far. The probably largest of these lakes is Lake Vostok, which is about 250 km long, 50 km wide, and up to 1 km deep, covering an area of 16000 km2 (30x Lake Constance) and a volume of 5000 km3 (100x Lake Constance). According to the pressure-dependent freezing point of water and the semi-empirical Equation of State, the water circulates within these lakes. This flow is geo-thermally and buoyancy (by melt and freeze processes) driven. We present an overview of mapped and modelled lakes within Antarctica, their impact on the ice flow/motion, hypothesis about a hydrological network, as well as their contribution to the total Antarctic fresh water budget.