Sediment Freeze-On and Transport Near the Onset of a Fast-Flowing Glacier in East Antarctica

Understanding the material properties and physical conditions of basal ice is crucial for a comprehensive understanding of Antarctic ice-sheet dynamics. Yet, direct data are sparse and difficult to acquire. Here, we employ ultra-wideband radar to map high-backscatter zones near the glacier bed within East Antarctica's Jutulstraumen drainage basin. Our backscatter analysis reveals that the basal ice in an area of similar to 10,000 km2 is composed of along-flow oriented sediment-laden basal ice units connected to the basal substrate, extending up to several hundred meters thick. Three-dimensional thermomechanical modeling supports that these units form via basal freeze-on of subglacial water that originated from further upstream. Our findings suggest that basal freeze-on, and the entrainment and transport of subglacial material play a significant role in an accurate representation of material, physical, and rheological properties of the Antarctic ice sheet's basal ice, ultimately enhancing the accuracy and reliability of ice-sheet modeling. We investigate the lowermost portion of the ice column of the Antarctic ice sheet, known as basal ice. This part holds crucial information about how the ice sheet behaves when it flows. Using the principle of echo-location, we use radar technology to scan the ice in East Antarctica's Jutulstraumen drainage basin. We discover that a significant portion of the basal ice in this region is filled with sediment and can be several hundred meters thick. To better understand how this distinctive type of ice forms, we used a mathematical model that suggested that these ice units likely form when water underneath the ice is transported and refreezes at particular locations. Our findings highlight the importance of these freezing and mixing of materials from beneath the ice. Understanding where these ice units are located provides important information for ice-flow models to ultimately better understand how the Antarctic ice sheet behaves in the future. We have identified high-scattering basal ice in Jutulstraumen Glacier's onset region using radar, reaching several hundred meters from the bed Backscatter analysis suggests that the basal ice units contain unstratified point scatters and cause little radio-glaciological loss 3D thermo-mechanical modeling implies that freeze-on of basal meltwater generated upstream likely initially formed the basal ice units