Ice shelves are sensitive elements of the climate system. Sandwiched between
atmosphere and ocean, they are vulnerable to changes in either. The recent
disintegration of ice shelves such as Larsen B and Wilkins on the Antarctic
Peninsula and current thinning of the ice shelves in the Amundsen Sea sector of
West Antarctic provide evidence of the rapidity with which they can respond.
Losses of floating ice appear to be intimately linked with acceleration and
thinning of the inland ice sheet, with immediate consequences for global sea
level. Studies of ice shelves addressing their dynamics and structure and their
interactions with atmosphere and ocean are the key to improving our
understanding of their response to climate forcing and of their buttressing role
for ice streams. The main themes of this session are the dynamics of ice shelves
and their interaction with the ocean, atmosphere and their tributary ice
streams, including grounding line dynamics. The session includes studies on related processes such as calving, ice
fracture, rifting and mass balance, as well as theoretical descriptions of
mechanical and thermodynamic processes. We seek contributions from numerical
modelling of ice shelves and their oceanic and atmospheric environments,
observational studies, including glaciological and oceanographic field
measurements, as well as remote sensing and laboratory studies.