Mid‐Holocene Grounding Line Retreat and Readvance at Whillans Ice Stream, West Antarctica
Ryan A. Venturelli, Matthew R. Siegfried, Kimberly Anne Roush, W. Li, Justin Burnett, Robert Zook, H. A. Fricker, John C. Priscu, Amy Leventer, B. E. Rosenheim
Abstract
Abstract Understanding ice sheet evolution through the geologic past can help constrain ice sheet models that predict future ice dynamics. Existing geological records of grounding line retreat in the Ross Sea, Antarctica, have been confined to ice‐free and terrestrial archives, which reflect dynamics from periods of more extensive ice cover. Therefore, our perspective of grounding line retreat since the Last Glacial Maximum remains incomplete. Sediments beneath Ross Ice Shelf and grounded ice offer complementary insight into the southernmost extent of grounding line retreat, yielding a more complete view of ice dynamics during deglaciation. Here we thermochemically separate the youngest organic carbon to estimate ages from sediments extracted near the Whillans Ice Stream grounding line to provide direct evidence for grounding line retreat in that region as recent as the mid‐Holocene (7.2 kyr B.P.). Our study demonstrates the utility of accurately dated, grounding‐line‐proximal sediment deposits for reconstructing past interactions between marine and subglacial environments.