Description: The Antarctic Ice Sheet represents the largest source of uncertainty in future sea level rise projections, with a contribution to sea level by 2100 ranging from −5 to 43 cm of sea level equivalent under high carbon emission scenarios estimated by the recent Ice Sheet Model Intercomparison for CMIP6 (ISMIP6). ISMIP6 highlighted the different behaviors of the East and West Antarctic ice sheets, as well as the possible role of increased surface mass balance in offsetting the dynamic ice loss in response to changing oceanic conditions in ice shelf cavities. However, the detailed contribution of individual glaciers, as well as the partitioning of uncertainty associated with this ensemble, have not yet been investigated. Here, we analyze the ISMIP6 results for high carbon emission scenarios, focusing on key glaciers around the Antarctic Ice Sheet, and we quantify their projected dynamic mass loss, defined here as mass loss through increased ice discharge into the ocean in response to changing oceanic conditions. We highlight glaciers contributing the most to sea level rise, as well as their vulnerability to changes in oceanic conditions. We then investigate the different sources of uncertainty and their relative role in projections, for the entire continent and for key individual glaciers. We show that, in addition to Thwaites and Pine Island glaciers in West Antarctica, Totten and Moscow University glaciers in East Antarctica present comparable future dynamic mass loss and high sensitivity to ice shelf basal melt. The overall uncertainty in additional dynamic mass loss in response to changing oceanic conditions, compared to a scenario with constant oceanic conditions, is dominated by the choice of ice sheet model, accounting for 52 % of the total uncertainty of the Antarctic dynamic mass loss in 2100. Its relative role for the most dynamic glaciers varies between 14 % for MacAyeal and Whillans ice streams and 56 % for Pine Island Glacier at the end of the century. The uncertainty associated with the choice of climate model increases over time and reaches 13 % of the uncertainty by 2100 for the Antarctic Ice Sheet but varies between 4 % for Thwaites Glacier and 53 % for Whillans Ice Stream. The uncertainty associated with the ice–climate interaction, which captures different treatments of oceanic forcings such as the choice of melt parameterization, its calibration, and simulated ice shelf geometries, accounts for 22 % of the uncertainty at the ice sheet scale but reaches 36 % and 39 % for Institute Ice Stream and Thwaites Glacier, respectively, by 2100. Overall, this study helps inform future research by highlighting the sectors of the ice sheet most vulnerable to oceanic warming over the 21st century and by quantifying the main sources of uncertainty.

Description: In order to complement the picture of the atmospheric water cycle in the Southern Ocean, we have continuously monitored water vapor isotopes since January 2020 on Amsterdam Island in the Indian Ocean. We present here the first 2-year long water vapor isotopic record at this site. We show that the water vapor isotopic composition largely follows the water vapor mixing ratio, as expected in marine boundary layers. However, we detect 11 periods of a few days where there is a strong loss of correlation between water vapor δ18O and water vapor mixing ratio as well as abrupt negative excursions of water vapor δ18O. These excursions often occur toward the end of precipitation events. Six of these events show a decrease in gaseous elemental mercury, suggesting subsidence of air from a higher altitude. Our study aims to further explore the mechanism driving these negative excursions in water vapor δ18O. We used two different models to provide a data–model comparison over this 2-year period. While the European Centre Hamburg model (ECHAM6-wiso) at 0.9° was able to reproduce most of the sharp negative water vapor δ18O excursions, hence validating the physics process and isotopic implementation in this model, the Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique Zoom model (LMDZ-iso) at 2° (3°) resolution was only able to reproduce seven (one) of the negative excursions, highlighting the possible influence of the model resolution for the study of such abrupt isotopic events. Based on our detailed model–data comparison, we conclude that the most plausible explanations for such isotopic excursions are rain–vapor interactions associated with subsidence at the rear of a precipitation event.

Description: In a context of global warming and sea level rise acceleration, it is key to estimate the evolution of the atmo- spheric hydrological cycle and temperature in polar regions, which directly influence the surface mass balance of the Arc- tic and Antarctic ice sheets. Direct observations are available from satellite data for the last 40 years and a few weather data since the 1950s in Antarctica. One of the best ways to access longer records is to use climate proxies in firn or ice cores. The water isotopic composition in these cores is widely used to reconstruct past temperature variations. We need to progress in our understanding of the influence of the atmospheric hydrological cycle on the water isotopic composition of ice cores. First, we present a 2-year-long time series of vapor and precipitation isotopic composition mea- surement at Dumont d’Urville Station, in Adélie Land. We characterize diurnal variations of meteorological parameters (temperature, atmospheric water mixing ratio (hereafter hu- midity) and δ18O) for the different seasons and determine the evolution of key relationships (δ18O versus temperature or humidity) throughout the year: we find that the temper- ature vs. δ18O relationship is dependent on synoptic events dynamics in winter contrary to summer. Then, this data set is used to evaluate the atmospheric general circulation model ECHAM6-wiso (model version with embedded water stable isotopes) in a coastal region of Adélie Land where local con- ditions are controlled by strong katabatic winds which directly impact the isotopic signal. We show that a combina- tion of continental (79 %) and oceanic (21 %) grid cells leads model outputs (temperature, humidity and δ18O) to nicely fit the observations, at different timescales (i.e., seasonal to syn- optic). Therefore we demonstrate the added value of long- term water vapor isotopic composition records for model evaluation. Then, as a clear link is found between the isotopic compo- sition of water vapor and precipitation, we assess how iso- topic models can help interpret short firn cores. In fact, a virtual firn core built from ECHAM-wiso outputs explains much more of the variability observed in S1C1 isotopic record than a virtual firn core built from temperature only. Yet, deposition and post-deposition effects strongly affect the firn isotopic signal and probably account for most of the re- maining misfits between archived firn signal and virtual firn core based on atmospheric modeling.