Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters

Abstract The supply of freshwater to fjord systems in Greenland is increasing as a result of climate change-induced acceleration in ice sheet melt. However, insight into the marine implications of the melt water is impaired by lack of observations demonstrating the fate of freshwater along the Green...

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Autores principales:	Mikael K. Sejr, Colin A. Stedmon, Jørgen Bendtsen, Jakob Abermann, Thomas Juul-Pedersen, John Mortensen, Søren Rysgaard
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	Nature Portfolio 2017
Materias:	Medicine R Science Q
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/8cc7e9d5bbbd481e9c254a9bfc68eff4
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id	oai:doaj.org-article:8cc7e9d5bbbd481e9c254a9bfc68eff4
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:8cc7e9d5bbbd481e9c254a9bfc68eff42021-12-02T15:05:50ZEvidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters10.1038/s41598-017-10610-92045-2322https://doaj.org/article/8cc7e9d5bbbd481e9c254a9bfc68eff42017-10-01T00:00:00Zhttps://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-10610-9https://doaj.org/toc/2045-2322Abstract The supply of freshwater to fjord systems in Greenland is increasing as a result of climate change-induced acceleration in ice sheet melt. However, insight into the marine implications of the melt water is impaired by lack of observations demonstrating the fate of freshwater along the Greenland coast and providing evaluation basis for ocean models. Here we present 13 years of summer measurements along a 120 km transect in Young Sound, Northeast Greenland and show that sub-surface coastal waters are decreasing in salinity with an average rate of 0.12 ± 0.05 per year. This is the first observational evidence of a significant freshening on decadal scale of the waters surrounding the ice sheet and comes from a region where ice sheet melt has been less significant. It implies that ice sheet dynamics in Northeast Greenland could be of key importance as freshwater is retained in southward flowing coastal currents thus reducing density of water masses influencing major deep water formation areas in the Subarctic Atlantic Ocean. Ultimately, the observed freshening could have implications for the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation.Mikael K. SejrColin A. StedmonJørgen BendtsenJakob AbermannThomas Juul-PedersenJohn MortensenSøren RysgaardNature PortfolioarticleMedicineRScienceQENScientific Reports, Vol 7, Iss 1, Pp 1-6 (2017)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Medicine R Science Q
spellingShingle	Medicine R Science Q Mikael K. Sejr Colin A. Stedmon Jørgen Bendtsen Jakob Abermann Thomas Juul-Pedersen John Mortensen Søren Rysgaard Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters
description	Abstract The supply of freshwater to fjord systems in Greenland is increasing as a result of climate change-induced acceleration in ice sheet melt. However, insight into the marine implications of the melt water is impaired by lack of observations demonstrating the fate of freshwater along the Greenland coast and providing evaluation basis for ocean models. Here we present 13 years of summer measurements along a 120 km transect in Young Sound, Northeast Greenland and show that sub-surface coastal waters are decreasing in salinity with an average rate of 0.12 ± 0.05 per year. This is the first observational evidence of a significant freshening on decadal scale of the waters surrounding the ice sheet and comes from a region where ice sheet melt has been less significant. It implies that ice sheet dynamics in Northeast Greenland could be of key importance as freshwater is retained in southward flowing coastal currents thus reducing density of water masses influencing major deep water formation areas in the Subarctic Atlantic Ocean. Ultimately, the observed freshening could have implications for the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation.
format	article
author	Mikael K. Sejr Colin A. Stedmon Jørgen Bendtsen Jakob Abermann Thomas Juul-Pedersen John Mortensen Søren Rysgaard
author_facet	Mikael K. Sejr Colin A. Stedmon Jørgen Bendtsen Jakob Abermann Thomas Juul-Pedersen John Mortensen Søren Rysgaard
author_sort	Mikael K. Sejr
title	Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters
title_short	Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters
title_full	Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters
title_fullStr	Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters
title_full_unstemmed	Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters
title_sort	evidence of local and regional freshening of northeast greenland coastal waters
publisher	Nature Portfolio
publishDate	2017
url	https://doaj.org/article/8cc7e9d5bbbd481e9c254a9bfc68eff4
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Evidence of local and regional freshening of Northeast Greenland coastal waters

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