Glaciation refers to the climatic and geophysical processes leading to the formation, expansion, and persistence of glaciers and ice sheets, and their subsequent sculpting of the Earth’s surface. It encompasses large-scale cooling, snow accumulation exceeding ablation, and dynamic ice flow driven by gravity and basal sliding. Glaciation cycles, governed primarily by orbital forcing (Milankovitch cycles), greenhouse gas concentrations, and feedbacks involving albedo and ocean circulation, produce glacial–interglacial variations in global climate. These events generate diagnostic landforms (e.g., moraines, drumlins, U-shaped valleys) and stratigraphic signatures, and they are central topics in Quaternary science, paleoclimatology, and Earth system modeling.
Much of Earth's heat uptake is passed to the ocean, making ocean heat content key for understanding long-term climate patterns. Ocean heat content is typically lower during ice ages and rises during warmer periods of glacier ...
Earth Sciences
Apr 14, 2025
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In the first study to consider the long-term evolution of the rivers that flow beneath glaciers, researchers have new insights into the future of Antarctica's melting ice that may change the way climate scientists predict ...
Earth Sciences
Mar 31, 2025
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Scientists from the University of Sheffield will warn policymakers that the shrinking glaciers of the Andes threaten the water supply of 90 million people on the South American continent at the first-ever World Day for Glaciers ...
Earth Sciences
Mar 21, 2025
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In mountain ranges around the world, glaciers are melting as global temperatures rise. Europe's Alps and Pyrenees lost 40% of their glacier volume from 2000 to 2023. These and other icy regions have provided freshwater for ...
Environment
Mar 19, 2025
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Between 18,000 and 11,000 years ago, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere suddenly shot up. This caused rapid global warming, the mass melting of glaciers, and the end of the last ice age.
Earth Sciences
Mar 19, 2025
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Between 15,000 and 8,000 years ago, the Earth experienced significant climatic changes, including the rapid retreat of ice sheets and rising sea levels, during the Glacial–Holocene transition. This period featured abrupt ...
Earth Sciences
Mar 17, 2025
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Bouncing back from under the weight of Ice Age glaciers which have long since vanished, the Nordic region land mass is slowly rising above sea level.
Planetary Sciences
Feb 5, 2025
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173
On a cold, ancient Mars, rivers flowed and a lake the size of the Mediterranean Sea swelled under the protection of thick ice ceilings, according to new research published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets.
Planetary Sciences
Nov 4, 2024
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