Ice shelves play a vital role in buttressing grounded ice sheets. The potential collapse of Antarctic ice shelves has been identified as a tipping point for rapid Antarctic mass loss and contributions to sea-level rise. In the Arctic, however, only few ice shelves remain, for example around the Greenland Ice Sheet and Canada’s Ellesmere Island. Improving our understanding of the complex processes affecting ice shelves is paramount for projecting their future evolution. This session will bring together research utilizing a wide range of methods to elucidate processes impacting the ice-shelf surface, base, dynamics and structural integrity.

Presentations are welcome from those undertaking both modeling and observational work. Potential topics may include, but are not limited to: surface melting and hydrology; ice-ocean interactions; ice-shelf buttressing and pinning points; iceberg calving; crevasse formation; grounding-zone mechanics; current, past and future change.