Kial Stewart: Laboratory experiments of processes at the ice-ocean interface
The ice-ocean boundary within ice-ocean cavities is an interface of great climate significance. The dynamics and thermodynamics occurring here govern not only the rate of glacial ice melt, but also the rates of marine ice formation and its subsequent melt. Direct observations of these processes in the real world are scarce and incredibly expensive to obtain. However, knowledge of these processes is vital to develop appropriate parameterisations for their accurate representation in numerical ocean simulations that include ice-ocean cavities. Precise and controlled laboratory experiments offer a convenient alternative to direct observations, and have long served to help develop our intuition for the governing dynamics at this ice-ocean interface. In this presentation, we will review recent efforts undertaken in the Climate & Fluid Physics Laboratory investigating these ice-ocean interface dynamics, and introduce new experiments currently underway that explore the effects of marine ice on glacial ice melt rates.