ANTARCTICA ICE-SHEET CURVATURE AND ITS RELATION WITH ICE FLOW AND BOUNDARY-CONDITIONS

The map of the Antarctica ice sheet surface curvature in the across-sl ope direction shows a very coherent pattern, related to ice flow anoma lies of each flowline with respect to adjacent ones. Near the coast, t hese anomalies are correlated to bedrock features which suggests that they result from outlet now conditions that are transmitted from coast to domes. As a consequence, they should represent the drainage patter n, glacier positions and 3-dimensional flowline directions. Thus a lar ge part of the ice sheet flow pattern seems controlled by outflow boun dary conditions which can be empirically estimated.