RESOLVING THE YOUNGER DRYAS EVENT THROUGH BOREHOLE THERMOMETRY

Meltwater influxes may partly explain the low oxygen-isotope values me asured in the Dye 3 and Camp Century ice cores. This has led to specul ation that Greenland may not have cooled during the Younger Dryas and underlined the need for independent checks of the oxygen-isotope recor d. Using optimal control methods and heat-flow modeling, the author ma kes a valiant but ultimately futile attempt to distinguish the Younger Dryas event in the ice-sheet temperatures measured at Dye 3, south Gr eenland. The author discusses the prospects for attempting the same in the new Summit boreholes in central Greenland: how that will require more accurate temperature measurements, a coupled thermo-mechanical mo del and a refined uncertainty analysis. He concludes by discussing how borehole-temperature analysis may improve the climate histories deter mined from ice cores.