Mathematical modelling of groundwater flow beneath the Antarctic ice sheet

A current and pressing challenge in fluid mechanics is to understand the behaviour of Earth's glaciers and ice sheets, and the potential effects of climate change on these. Part of this challenge includes modelling the flow of water at the base of the ice, which is of crucial importance to the dynamics of many of Antarctica's fastest-flowing glaciers due to its role in lubricating the bedrock over which the ice slides. Modelling subglacial water is a complex multiscale problem, with some water concentrated into channels and lakes and other water flowing through porous gravel and silt. Moreover, field observations of the conditions at the base of the ice are extremely difficult to obtain, making mathematical modelling approaches invaluable.

This project aims to contribute towards this rapidly evolving field by modelling in particular the flow of groundwater through "sedimentary basins", which are large rock aquifers underlying large regions of Antarctica. Sedimentary basins contribute to ice dynamics by exchanging water with the base of the ice. However, little modelling work has been done to understand this role, and field data on the properties of these sedimentary basins is very limited. This project aims to use mathematical modelling to better understand where and how Antarctic sedimentary basins exchange groundwater with the base of the ice and how this exchange affects the sliding of the ice, and to learn more about their properties by comparing the results of these models to field data. This involves constructing appropriate systems of partial differential equations based on existing theories of groundwater flow and ice sheet dynamics, analysing these equations using mathematical methods such as asymptotics, and solving them computationally in conjunction with field data.

This project falls within the ESPRC Continuum Mechanics and Fluid Mechanics research areas, due to its approach based on fluid mechanical modelling.