Ocean Floor to Ice Core: Using Earth’s archives to unravel ancient ice sheet mysteries

Abstract

During the last ice age, several mysterious events occurred that disrupted the large ice sheet over North America. These events, also known as Heinrich events, released “armadas” of icebergs into the North Atlantic ocean and coincide with changes in ocean circulation, precipitation, and ocean chemistry. While Heinrich events have been studied by scientists for decades, the full story of how they occurred and the total extent of their impacts remains unclear.

Ice core. Credit: TJ Fudge

This workshop will discuss how we can use evidence from Earth’s natural archives to unravel these mysterious events. Ice cores and ocean sediments contain stories much like a history book. Each ice bubble contains gases from Earth’s past atmosphere, providing insight into prior atmospheric conditions. Each sediment layer contains rock fragments delivered by icebergs, which can be traced back to their source ice sheet like puzzle pieces. It is the job of paleoclimate scientists like Danielle and Kaden to study these natural clues and reveal past ice sheet changes.

For this workshop, Danielle and Kaden will provide insight into the cutting edge methods paleoclimate scientists are using to improve our understanding of Heinrich events and their connection to other global changes.This workshop will show an ongoing artificial iceberg experiment at our David Center for Innovation and include a hands-on demonstration with homemade classroom sized icebergs to test in smaller tanks and interpret observations. Additionally, teachers will have the opportunity to tour the ice and sediment core lab facilities at WHOI to learn firsthand how sediments and ice can tell ancient stories.