During past periods of glacial advance, glaciers overrode soil, vegetation, and marine deposits, burying significant amounts of organic matter (OM) underneath ice. However, there is limited information on this subglacial OM because of the difficulty of direct access and the typically low content in the sediment. The fate of this glacial carbon under climate change and deglaciation is therefore not well understood.

In a new project called ‘OReOS‘ (Origin and Reactivity of Organic Matter in Sediments beneath the Greenland Ice Sheet) we will determine the origin and reactivity of OM in Greenland’s subglacial ecosystem using a combined approach of indirect (via collecting suspended sediment in glacial meltwater runoff) and direct (via coring sediment through boreholes) sampling of subglacial sediment and state-of-the-art analysis of present OM. The project builds on our previous & ongoing research (see e.g. here and here) and aims to shed light on one of the major unknowns in the ecology of deglaciation – the subglacial carbon stock under the rapidly melting GrIS and the bioavailability of this carbon – and enable better predictions of the ecosystem changes associated with the accelerating climate change in the Arctic.

The project team will consist of Marek (PI), Petra, Arthur, and two postdocs. We will also collaborate with our friends Jakub Trubač (Charles University’s isotope lab), Václav Tejnecký (Czech University of Life Sciences), Jon Hawkings (University of Pennsylvania) and Alun Hubbard (Oulu University).