A rapid sediment pulse induced by glacial melting during the MIS 8/7e transition buried well‐developed karst in the Railton Valley, Tasmania, Australia

Abstract Anthropogenic pollution strongly affects glacial microbiological communities and promotes glacial melting. In the early stages of glacial melting formation of small cylindrical holes (cryoconite) occurs. While the microbiome of cryoconite is well described, the effect of anthropogenic pollution on cryoconite microbiological communities still has not been fully understood. Thus, we performed an unbiased functional comparison of the cryoconite communities from the highly polluted Caucasian glaciers and from less polluted glaciers in Novaya Zemlya. For this purpose, we used the shotgun metaproteomics approach which has not been used for cryoconite microbiome analysis previously. We identified 475 protein groups, a third of which were found in both glaciers. Cryoconites in both glaciers have similar microbiological communities with Cyanobacteria as dominant phyla. Nevertheless, we found a slight shift from the dominance of phototrophic Cyanobacteria in Novaya Zemlya to heterotrophic bacteria in the Caucasus. We assume that it might be caused by anthropogenic pollution, but other factors such as differences in seasonal dynamics of microbiological communities should be tested in the future.

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Enhanced Himalayan Glacial Melting During YD and H1 Recorded in the Northern Bay of Bengal

Geochemistry Geophysics Geosystems ◽

10.1029/2018gc008065 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Syee Weldeab ◽

Carsten Rühlemann ◽

Bodo Bookhagen ◽

Francesco S. R. Pausata ◽

Fabiola M. Perez‐Lua

Keyword(s):

Bay Of Bengal ◽

Glacial Melting ◽

Northern Bay Of Bengal

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Past warmth drives glacial melting

Nature ◽

10.1038/505265b ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 505 (7483) ◽

pp. 265-265

Keyword(s):

Glacial Melting

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Changes in Major Global River Discharges Directed into the Ocean

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ◽

10.3390/ijerph16081469 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 16 (8) ◽

pp. 1469 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Xiaoqing Shi ◽

Tianling Qin ◽

Hanjiang Nie ◽

Baisha Weng ◽

Shan He

Keyword(s):

Human Activities ◽

Large Scale ◽

Climatic Factors ◽

Global Climate ◽

Influencing Factor ◽

Contribution Rate ◽

Monsoon Climate ◽

Humid Climate ◽

Change Rate ◽

Glacial Melting

Under the influence of global climate change, the discharges of major global rivers directed into the ocean have undergone significant changes. To study the trends and causes in discharge variation, we selected 40 large rivers and analyzed their annual discharges near their estuaries from 1960 to 2010. The method of runoff variation attribution analysis based on the Budyko hypothesis for large-scale basins was developed, in which influencing factors of human activities and glacial melting factors were added to the formula. The contribution rate of climate factors and human activities to changes in discharge were quantitatively identified. Climatic factors include precipitation, evapotranspiration and glacial melting. Human activity factors include underlying surface and artificial water transfer. The contribution rate is determined by the elastic coefficient, which is obtained by the ratio of change rate of each factor and the change rate of runoff. The results indicated that the discharges predominantly showed downward trends with a few upward trends. Rivers in North America and Africa showed downward trends, and those in Europe principally showed upward trends. Climate was the main influencing factor of discharges changes, and only approximately 25% of river discharges were greatly affected by human activities. River discharges in 75% of the basins which mainly contains subtropical monsoon humid climate and savanna climate zones showed upward trends. In the four basins which are mainly contains tropical rainforest climate and tropical monsoon climate, they all showed downward trends. The trend of discharges in the temperate monsoon climate, temperate continental climate, and temperate maritime climate cannot be accurately judged because of irregular variation. The discharges in the mid-high latitudinal zones predominantly showed upward trends, while those in the mid-low latitudinal zones with the influence of human activities showed downward trends.

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