The Greenland ice sheet through the last glacial-interglacial cycle

The evolution of the Greenland ice sheet during the last 150,000 years, in response to a climate history derived from a Greenland ice-margin oxygen-18 record,is simulated by means of a three-dimensional, time-dependent ice-sheet model. The calculations indicate that the ice sheet displayed considerable thinning andice-margin retreat during the last interglacial (the Eemian) and during a warm interstadial c. 100,000 yr B.P., resulting in splitting up of the ice sheet into acentral-northern and a southern part. However, the ice sheet in Central Greenland survived the warm stages with almost unchanged surface elevations ascompared with the present.