Past Events

Rapid supraglacial lake drainages on the Greenland Ice Sheet: Drainage mechanisms and annual ice-sheet flow.

Greenland is covered in supraglacial lakes, lakes sitting on top of the ice surface. These lakes can rapidly drain sending a large pulse of water to the glacier bed. Laura has done pivotal work on determining what effect his process has on the ice sheet’s speed and dynamics. Laura will be giving a talk on rapid supraglacial lake drainages on the Greenland Ice Sheet, drainage mechanisms, and annual ice-sheet flow. She will be focusing on how Greenland connects to the broader picture of climate change and what further melting looks like for the ice sheet.

Laura Stevens is a postdoctoral research scientist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and recently received her PhD in glaciology from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. Her research focuses on the hydrology and dynamics of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Using a combination of seismometers, satellite remote sensing, ice sheet models, and direct measurements, Laura has been able to show connections between the drainage of meltwater at the ice sheet surface and basal slip. Her results have led to a number of prestigious publications including publications in Nature, Geophysical Research Letters, and The Cryosphere.