Evolution of Emerging Post-glacial Landscapes induced by a Changing Climate

Emerging post-glacial landscapes are highly dynamic and transient, with periglacial and fluvial processes at work in settings that exhibit a strong legacy of recent glaciation (Baynes et al., 2015). Under a changing climate and with the resulting potential for rapid and ice-loss, an increasing number of landscapes are under threat of transitioning from glacial to post-glacial conditions.

The impact on landscape morphology (such as valley shape) and landscape processes (within channels and on hillslopes), remains unknown (Dadson and Church, 2005; Shugar et al., 2017) but could be important for understanding emerging geohazards such as landsliding (Schonfeldt et al., 2020) or glacial lake outburst floods (Cook et al., 2018) due to heightened rates of erosion focused in particular areas.

This PhD will harness innovative GIS-based remote sensing and topographic analysis methods to explore the typical morphological signature of emerging post-glacial landscapes, such as the regions that surround the Greenland Ice Sheet that are characterised by historic and ongoing ice-mass loss (Figure 1). The analysis will identify and highlight regions undergoing rapid landscape change in response to the transition to post-glacial conditions.

Where possible, rates of landscape change will be calculated using existing geochronological estimates for the timing of deglaciation (e.g., radiocarbon ages of sediments or cosmogenic exposure ages of rock surfaces). The morphology and processes of emerging post-glacial landscapes (e.g., Greenland) will also be compared to established post-glacial landscapes (e.g., Scotland; Jansen et al. 2011), allowing a space-for-time analysis of landscape evolution following the transition from glacial to post-glacial environments.

The findings from this project will lead to a step-change in the understanding of dynamic and emerging landscapes that are under threat from a changing climate. There are exciting implications for associated analysis of geohazards and insights into expected future rates of landscape change.