The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are both losing mass to the ocean, largely driven by changes around their margins where warmer ocean waters are coming into contact with the undersides of the glaciers and ice shelves.The circulation of the adjacent oceans are strongly coupled through physical processes occurring at the ice-ocean interfaces at the fronts and bases of ice shelves and glacier tongues, and the termini of tidewater glaciers.
Polar organisms have adapted their seasonal cycles to the dynamic interface between ice and water. This interface ranges from the micrometer-sized brine channels within sea ice to the planetary-scale advance and retreat of sea ice.
Scripps Polar Center researchers study a broad range of processes in the Arctic and Southern Oceans. High latitude oceans play key roles in the global climate system.
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