When glacial giants roll over

Published: Dec 1, 2011 by The PISM Authors


Title	When glacial giants roll over
Authors	Anders Leverman, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK)
Venue	Nature
Location	Antarctic ice sheet

In a short News & Views article in Nature, Levermann reviews the potential for tsunami-genic iceberg calving as a phenomenon and a possible hazard. PISM-PIK Antarctic ice sheet simulations gave the frequency distribution of iceberg height and energy in discharge events per decade; see box. Iceberg discharge was computed from the vertical extent of the ice sheet and the marginal velocity distribution in a present-day equilibrium state. The results show a peak in the abundance of icebergs with a height of around 400 metres, and a distribution of energies up to several kilotonnes of TNT.

In the department of Integrative Earth system science at the newly founded Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology (MPI-GEA) in Jena, Germany, we are providing a three-year PhD position as part of the DFG priority program “Antarctic Research with Comparative Investigations in Arctic Ice Areas”.

A two-year PostDoc positions in ice sheet and Earth system modelling is available in the Ice Dynamics group, as part of the new Earth Resilience Science Unit (ERSU), at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK).

Two PhD fellowship positions in ice sheet modelling are advertised at the Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen.