Biotic gas generation from the degradation of organic carbon in marine sediments supplies and maintains gas hydrates throughout the world’s oceans. In nascent, ultraslow-spreading ocean basins, methane generation can also be abiotic, occurring during the high-temperature (>200 °C) serpentinization of ultramafic rocks. Here, we report on the evolution of a growing Arctic gas- and gas hydrate–charged ...

While there are numerous hypotheses concerning glacial–interglacial environmental and climatic regime shifts in the Arctic Ocean, a holistic view on the Northern Hemisphere's late Quaternary ice-sheet extent and their impact on ocean and sea-ice dynamics remains to be established. Here we aim to provide a step in this direction by presenting an overview of Arctic Ocean glacial history, based on the ...

The Eurasian ice-sheet complex (EISC) was the third largest ice mass during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), after the Antarctic and North American ice sheets. Despite its global significance, a comprehensive account of its evolution from independent nucleation centres to its maximum extent is conspicuously lacking. Here, a first-order, thermomechanical model, robustly constrained by empirical evidence, ...

The marine-based Barents Sea Ice Sheet covered the polar continental shelf north of Norway and western Russia during the Last Glacial Maximum. Initial ice sheet retreat along the western margin is well established, while the retreat pattern in the interior parts of the ice sheet remains poorly known. Here we present new geological data from the central Barents Sea. The results are based on analysis ...

Ice-stream dynamics are strongly controlled by processes taking place at the ice/bed interface where subglacial water both lubricates the base and saturates any existing, underlying sediment. Large parts of the former Eurasian ice sheet were underlain by thick sequences of soft, marine sediments and many areas are imprinted with geomorphological features indicative of fast flow and wet basal conditions. ...

In 2014, the discovery of seafloor mounds leaking methane gas into the water column in the northwestern Barents Sea became the first to document the existence of non‐permafrost related gas hydrate pingos (GHP) on the Eurasian Arctic shelf. The discovered site is given attention because the gas hydrates occur close to the upper limit of the gas hydrate stability, thus may be vulnerable to climatic ...

Geomorphological evidence suggests that ice streams undergo frequent dynamic changes towards the end of their life cycles, but the associated sedimentary characteristics and processes remain poorly understood. Here, we present new sedimentological data from a Late Weichselian marine‐based ice stream in upper Bjørnøyrenna, northern Barents Sea, which experienced accelerated flow, intense calving of ...

Recent developments in seismic acquisition systems and seismic data visualization have contributed to improve the imaging of seismic geomorphologies over a broad range of topics. This study focuses on a new high-resolution P-Cable 3D seismic cube located in the Hoop area in the SW Barents Sea. The scientific motivations of the study are (1) to document glacial landforms on a meter-scale, (2) to study ...

As ice flows over a subglacial lake, the drop in bed resistance leads to an increase in ice velocities and a draw down of isochrones and cold ice. The ice surface flattens as it adjusts to the lack of resisting forces at the base. The rapid transition in velocity induces changes in ice viscosity and releases deformation energy that can raise the temperature locally. Recent studies of Antarctic ...