About this project or challenge area

Parts of the Antarctic ice sheet are thought to have collapsed in the past, most recently during the Last Interglacial period (between 130 000 and 115 000 years before present) and may well do so again in the future in response to continued global warming. The long-term implications of this collapse on global sea level are well documented, however the impacts of the associated influxes of freshwater on the global ocean are largely unstudied. Some more extreme scenarios suggest rates of mass loss equivalent to 5 cm yr^-1 global sea level rise through this and the next century, while more widely supported scenarios still imply rates equivalent to 1-2 cm yr^-1.

The project will address this gap in the literature by using a climate model in a suite of experiments forced with varying fluxes of freshwater entering the Southern Ocean and covering a range of potential rates and durations of collapse, and will assess impacts on key phenomena such as the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and North Atlantic Overturning Circulation. Results from the project will have implications for both projections of future climate change (which typically do not include these effects) and the interpretation of the paleoclimatic record.

Why choose this project?

This project will allow you to develop skills in the analysis and interpretation of climate simulations, as well as the programming skills needed to run climate models on supercomputers. The project is tailored towards the publications of its results and will allow you to develop scientific writing and presentation skills. The project will also provide opportunities to collaborate with researchers based at the Met Office Hadley Centre and the National Centre for Atmospheric Science.

About you

This project would suit students with a background in physical, environmental, or geographical sciences with an interest in climate change. The project will involve running climate models on the University’s high-performance computing facilities and analysing the data produced by these simulations. It is recommended that students have some experience of programming, for example using MATLAB, R or Python.

How to apply

All students can apply using the button below, following the Admissions Statement (PDF, 188kB). Please note that this is an advertised project, which means you only have to complete Section A of the Research Statement.

This project is not funded, for further details please use this link.

Before applying, we recommend getting in touch with the project's supervisors. If you are interested in this project and would like to learn more about the research you will be undertaking, please use the contact details on this page.