Rapid Glacier-Ocean Interaction Observed by Terrestrial Radar Interferometry

Polar glaciers are changing rapidly under the background of global warming and usually calve when interacting with surrounding oceans. These glaciers are widely detected by satellite remote sensing. However, the time resolution of satellite remote sensing is usually several days, which is inadequate to reveal the rapid change and calving process of polar glaciers. To detect the rapid response of polar glaciers, especially glacier front on various oceanic forcing, such as ocean tide, Terrestrial Radar Interferometry (TRI) has been introduced to detect the Digital Elevation Model (DEM), glacier velocity change and some more complicating glacier-ocean interaction processes. Here we show some typical applications of the TRI in glacier-ocean interaction study, which contributes to better understanding how ocean affecting glacier changes. TRI observation can enrich data source for glacier change study and will provide fundamental validation data for computer modeling to better understand the different mechanism of glacier-ocean interaction.