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Abstract. Ice-sheet models used to predict sea-level rise often neglect subglacial hydrology. However, theory and observations suggest that ice flow and subglacial water flow are bidirectionally coupled: ice geometry affects hydraulic potential, hydraulic potential modulates basal shear stress via the basal water pressure, and ice flow advects the subglacial drainage system. This coupling could impact rates of ice mass change but remains poorly understood. We develop a coupled ice–subglacial-hydrology model to investigate the effects of coupling on the long-term evolution of marine-terminating ice sheets. We combine a one-dimensional channelized subglacial hydrology model with a depth-integrated marine-ice-sheet model, incorporating each component of the coupling listed above, yielding a set of differential equations that we solve using a finite-difference, implicit time-stepping approach. We conduct a series of experiments with this model, using either bidirectional or unidirectional coupling. These experiments generate profiles of channel cross-sectional area, channel flow rate, channel effective pressure, ice thickness, and ice velocity. We discuss how the profiles shape one another, resulting in the effective pressure reaching a local maximum in a region near the grounding line. We also describe the impact of bidirectional coupling on the transient retreat of ice sheets through a comparison of our coupled model with ice-flow models that have imposed static basal conditions. We find that including coupled subglacial hydrology leads to grounding-line retreat that is virtually absent when static basal conditions are assumed. This work highlights the role time-evolving subglacial drainage may have in ice-sheet change and informs efforts to include it in ice-sheet models. This work also supplies a physical basis for a commonly used parameterization which assumes that the subglacial water pressure is set by the bed's depth beneath the sea surface.
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Elastic-instability–enabled locomotion
Locomotion of an organism interacting with an environment is the consequence of a symmetry-breaking action in space-time. Here we show a minimal instantiation of this principle using a thin circular sheet, actuated symmetrically by a pneumatic source, using pressure to change shape nonlinearly via a spontaneous buckling instability. This leads to a polarized, bilaterally symmetric cone that can walk on land and swim in water. In either mode of locomotion, the emergence of shape asymmetry in the sheet leads to an asymmetric interaction with the environment that generates movement––via anisotropic friction on land, and via directed inertial forces in water. Scaling laws for the speed of the sheet of the actuator as a function of its size, shape, and the frequency of actuation are consistent with our observations. The presence of easily controllable reversible modes of buckling deformation further allows for a change in the direction of locomotion in open arenas and the ability to squeeze through confined environments––both of which we demonstrate using simple experiments. Our simple approach of harnessing elastic instabilities in soft structures to drive locomotion enables the design of novel shape-changing robots and other bioinspired machines at multiple scales.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1922321
- PAR ID:
- 10296199
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Volume:
- 118
- Issue:
- 8
- ISSN:
- 0027-8424
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- e2013801118
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2013801118
