Related papers: What is glacier sliding
The friction of a stationary moving skate on smooth ice is investigated, in particular in relation to the formation of a thin layer of water between skate and ice. It is found that the combination of ploughing and sliding gives a friction…
Many fast-flowing glaciers and ice streams move over beds consisting of reworked sediments and erosional products, commonly referred to as till. The complex interplay between ice, meltwater, and till at the subglacial bed connects several…
Mechanical and sliding instabilities are the two processes which may lead to breaking off events of large ice masses. Mechanical instabilities mainly affect unbalanced cold hanging glaciers. For the latter case, a prediction could be…
The shallow shelf approximation is a better ``sliding law'' for ice sheet modeling than those sliding laws in which basal velocity is a function of driving stress. The shallow shelf approximation as formulated by \emph{Schoof} [2006a] is…
When solids melt while sliding down heated inclines, their motion is governed by a complex coupling between heat transfer, phase change, gravity and viscous dissipation. Despite relevance across a variety of domains, like kitchen physics,…
We investigate the nature of friction in granular layers by means of numerical simulation focusing on the critical slip distance, over which the system relaxes to a new stationary state. Analyzing a transient process in which the sliding…
The dynamics of many of Antarctica's glaciers are modulated by a hydrological system at the base of the ice. Sedimentary basins beneath the ice bed contribute to the water budget in this hydrological system by discharging or taking up…
Liquid drops slide more slowly over soft, deformable substrates than over rigid solids. This phenomenon can be attributed to the viscoelastic dissipation induced by the moving wetting ridge, which inhibits a rapid motion, and is called…
Sublimation of drifting snow, which is significant for the balances of mass and energy of the polar ice sheet, is a complex physical process with intercoupling between ice crystals, wind field, temperature, and moisture. Here a…
Ice streams are bands of fast-flowing ice in ice sheets. We investigate their formation as an example of spontaneous pattern formation, based on positive feedbacks between dissipation and basal sliding. Our focus is on temperature-dependent…
Observations have long associated ice streams with the presence of meltwater at the bed. More recently, theoretical models have been able to reproduce ice-stream behaviour as a consequence of the coupled dynamics of ice and subglacial…
We study the lubrication of fluid-immersed soft interfaces and show that elastic deformation couples tangential and normal forces and thus generates lift. We consider materials that deform easily, due to either geometry (e.g. a shell) or…
Snow slab avalanche release usually results from failure of weak layers made of loose ice crystals. In previous field experiments, we evidenced for the first time an interesting stress-driven transition in the weak layer between a granular…
We investigate the effective friction encountered by a mass sliding on a granular layer as a function of bed thickness and boundary roughness conditions. The observed friction has minima for a small number of layers before it increases and…
Convective flows coupled with solidification or melting in water bodies play a major role in shaping geophysical landscapes. Particularly in relation to the global climate warming scenario, it is essential to be able to accurately quantify…
The nonlinear dynamics associated with sliding friction forms a broad interdisciplinary research field that involves complex dynamical processes and patterns covering a broad range of time and length scales. Progress in experimental…
Cross country skiing is an interplay between the active motion of the body of the skier and the physical interaction between the surface of the skis and the snow. Friction and glide between the ski base and the snow depend on the snow…
A disordered quasi-liquid layer of water is thought to cover the ice surface, but many issues, such as its onset temperature, its thickness, or its actual relation to bulk liquid water have been a matter of unsettled controversy for more…
A huge number of technological and biological systems involves the lubricated contact between rough surfaces of soft solids in relative accelerated motion. Examples include dynamical rubber seals and the human joints. In this study we…
Iceberg drift and decay and the associated freshwater release are increasingly seen as important processes in Earth's climate system, yet a detailed understanding of their dynamics has remained elusive. Here, an idealized model of iceberg…