Quaternary changes in level of the upper Taylor Glacier, Antarctica: implications for paleoclimate and East Antarctic Ice Sheet dynamics

Abstract

Glacial drifts perched alongside outlet glaciers that drain through the Transantarctic Mountains constrain inland polar plateau ice elevations. The Taylor Glacier, which heads in the Taylor Dome (a peripheral dome of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet), drains East Antarctic ice into the Dry Valleys sector of Transantarctic Mountains and terminates in central Taylor Valley, about 24 km west of the Ross Sea. Five gravel‐rich drifts (including 39 distinct moraine ridges) fringe a lateral lobe of the Taylor Glacier in the lower Arena Valley, Quartermain Mountains, southern Victoria Land. 3He and 10Be exposure age dating (from Brook et al. 1992), together with Arena Valley stratigraphy and soil morphologic data, provide chronologic control for these drifts and constrain maximum Quaternary thickening of the inland Taylor ice dome to less than 160 m. These minor Quaternary expansions of Taylor Glacier were out‐of‐phase with outlet glaciers that pass through the Transantarctic Mountains and terminate in the Ross Sea north and south of the Dry Valleys region. Textural analyses suggest that drift deposition occurred from cold‐based ice, even though Taylor Glacier advances most likely occurred during global interglaciations. The thermal regime of former Taylor Glacier ice lobes, the character of geomorphic features superimposed on individual drifts, the chemical composition of soils developed on Taylor drifts, and the stability of in situ moraine ridges on steep valley walls suggest that the present cold‐desert climate in Arena Valley has persisted for at least the last 2.2 Ma.