Understanding the rapid response of glaciers and ice sheets to environmental change

Research interests

We draw on seismology and other geophysical techniques to understand glacier dynamics, including iceberg calving, water flow through glaciers, dynamic thinning, and the ice flow response to variable glacier hydrology. Through theory and numerical analysis, we test explanations for our glaciological observations. This work is motivated by the need to understand rapid glacier change, its impact on sea level, and on landscape change. Specifically, our research interests and expertise include:

• the projection of sea-level rise from Earth's ice sheets,
• glacier dynamics (the factors that make a glacier speed up or slow down, advance or retreat)
• the generation and transmission of seismic waves
• iceberg calving and submarine melt at the fronts of tidewater glaciers
• water flow through and beneath glaciers
• processes that act on and shape the earth's surface

The Glacier Dynamics Group is led by Dr. Timothy Bartholomaus at the University of Idaho, in Moscow, ID. Dr. Bartholomaus is a glaciologist, geophysicist, educator and Associate Professor. He was formerly a Research Associate and Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics, in Austin, TX. He received a Ph.D. in Geophysics from the University of Alaska in Fairbanks in December 2013, completed a master's degree at the University of Colorado Boulder, and a bachelor's degree at Dartmouth College.

Meet the team · CV