Microparticles in snow from the South Greenland ice sheet

J. P. Steffensen

doi:10.3402/tellusb.v37i4-5.15031

Microparticles in snow from the South Greenland ice sheet

Tellus B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology

Volume 37 (1985): Issue 4-5

By: J. P. Steffensen

Open Access

|Jan 1985

Abstract

A detailed analysis of the concentration and the size distribution of insoluble microparticles (dust) in snow from the South Greenland ice sheet covering the years 1980-1983 has been carried out. An approximative description of the temporal variations of the size distributions has been obtained using Junge distributions to describe the general features of the measured size distributions in the size interval 0.55-2.5 μm. Variations of the 3 measured parameters, the bulk dust concentration, N_0.5, the slope of the Junge distribution, β, and the δ¹⁸O value of the snow are compared and discussed. The slope, p, varies seasonally, i.e., low values in winter and high in summer, and β appears to be closer related to the δ¹⁸O values of the snow than the bulk dust Concentration. In conclusion, analysis of the dust-size distribution may help to improve stratigraphic icecore dating. The δ¹⁸O values of the snow are found to vary in parallel with the temperature at coastal stations in South Greenland. This opens the possibility to date snow strata of the order of a month, provided that diffusion has not yet obliterated the subannual variations of δ180.

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