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MULTi-proxy evidence of recent cLimATe and glaciEr variability in an Arctic fjoRd: Kongsfjorden, SvALbard (MULTILATERAL)
Call year: 2024
Status: active
IADC_id: 800
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The Svalbard’s climate has undergone faster warming than any other region in the Northern Hemisphere over the past decades as a result of Arctic amplification (Hanssen-Bauer et al., 2019), with major consequences for seasonal sea ice, destabilization of marine terminating glaciers, meltwater outflow, and glacier retreat. The Svalbard’s glaciers are highly sensitive to these amplified climate fluctuations and transfer this signal to the marine sediments downstream Arctic fjords (van Pelt et al. 2019). According to instrumental records, the Kongsfjorden has also shown significant changes in hydrography and inflow of warm Atlantic Water (AW) over the last decades (Rovere et al., 2022) and is an ideal natural laboratory to constrain modern climate variability and glacier response, representing one of the most comprehensive environmental monitoring locations in the Arctic. In addition, this fjord benefits from historical and modelled data on past glaciers’ margin positions, extending records of glaciers and climate indicators back to the 20th century, in addition to time-series ocean data from fixed observatories.The objective of this project is to analyze marine sediment cores collected along a transect at increasing distance from tidewater glaciers within the fjord area at high temporal resolution (yearly to decadal) and use them to capture signatures of modern ice and glacier changes in response to climate and ocean warming extending back to the past century. To this end, the modern history of ocean-climate-glacier interactions will be reconstructed by a combination of multiple proxy physical and geochemical data on the sediment cores, integrated with extensive instrumental and observational data on the properties of water masses.The additional use of a Bayesian age-depth model based on 210Pb activity will provide high-resolution chronological evidence to constrain the timing of the deposition of lithogenic material transported into the fjord. Physical proxies, including X-ray radiography, bulk density, and the lithogenic grain size composition of sediment cores (i.e., ice-rafted debris, IRD) isolated prior to grain size analysis (Jonkers et al., 2015), will be complemented by high-resolution records of XRF scanning of bulk chemistry. Patterns in temporal variations of element intensity ratios (e.g., Ti/K, Zr/Rb, Ca/Fe, and Ca/Sr) in the sediment records will be paralleled to changes in the flux of the lithogenic fraction and assessed against glacier margin changes and climate records. The toolbox of physical and geochemical (XRF) proxy data in combination with multivariate statistical analysis will help to find a correspondence between our downcore proxy records and a combination of observed and modelled data on glacimarine dynamics (e.g., advances and retreats of tidewater glaciers, seasonal sea ice cover) and the dominant climatic and oceanic conditions at decadal and yearly resolution.rnrnREFERENCESrnDe Rovere F, Langone L, Schroeder K, Miserocchi S, Giglio F, Aliani S, and Chiggiato J (2022) Water Mass Variability in Inner Kongsfjorden (Svalbard) During 2010–2020. Front. Mar. Sci. 9:741075. doi: 10.3389/fmars.2022.741075rnHanssen-Bauer, I.; Førland, E.J.; Hisdal, H.; Mayer, S.; Sandø, A.B.; and Sorteberg, A. (eds) (2019) Climate in Svalbard 2100: a knowledge base for climate adaptation. Norway, Norwegian Centre of Climate Services (NCCS) for Norwegian Environment Agency (Miljødirektoratet), 208 pp. (NCCS report 1/2019).rnJonkers, L., Barker, S., Hall, I. R., & Prins, M. A. (2015). Correcting for the influence of ice-rafted detritus on grain size-based paleocurrent speed estimates. Paleoceanography, 30, 1347–1357. https://doi.org/10.1002/2015PA002830rnW. van Pelt, V. Pohjola, R. Pettersson, S. Marchenko, J. Kohler and B. Luks, et al. A long-term dataset of climatic mass balance, snow conditions, and runoff in Svalbard (1957–2018), Cryosphere, 2019, 13, 2259–2280rn
National/International Cooperation:
Mobility CONFAP Italy – University of Bologna is a bilateral program between that awards scholarships to PhD students and Post Doc researchers based in Brazil to perform a mobility period at the University of Bologna, Italy. Project: ‘Climate and anthropogenic changes in the Arctic’ funded under the Program Mobility CONFAP Italy (MCI) - University of Bologna. PI: Roberta Guerra (University of Bologna, Co-PI Leonardo Langone (ISP-CNR).rnhttps://site.unibo.it/mobility-confap-italy/en/research-opportunity-offers-in-italy/mathematical-physical-chemical-and-astronomical-sciences/phd-future-earth-climate-change-and-societal-challenges-research-area-climate-and-anthropogenic-changes-in-the-arcticrnrnFresh water Input in the Kongsfjorden (FIKO) project aims to acquire measurements of the chemical and physical characteristics of water masses in Kongsfjorden, and estimate the amount of fresh water released from glaciers, in order to study the interactions of this water with the warmer Atlantic waters. PI: Federico Giglio, ISP-CNR.rnrnARICE, Arctic Research Icebreaker Consortium, EU HORIZON-2020. CNR scientific coordinator L. Langone.rnKongsfjorden System Flagship programme, to facilitate structured research activities, increase collaborations in the field, and improving sharing of data - Norwegian Polar Institute (NPI)rn
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