Extent and dynamics of the former Patagonian Ice Sheet.

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My PhD investigates the response of Patagonian palaeo-glaciers, and their proglacial/ice-dammed lakes, to the onset of deglaciation following the end of the Southern Hemisphere Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). During the LGM, the Patagonian Ice Sheet covered most of Chile, calving into the Pacific to the West and terminating in the Argentinean foothills to the East. Most chronological data are focused around the Northern (NPI, 46-47oS), Southern (SPI, 48-51oS) and Cordillera Darwin (CDI, 54oS) Icefields, and there are few data North of the NPI. This latitudinal focusing of data impedes our ability to assess climatic or dynamical controls on ice sheet recession. Likewise, a paucity of regional high-resolution geomorphological mapping impedes our ability to examine latitudinal variations in the style and manner of glacier recession. My PhD aims to provide a detailed assessment of sediment-landform assemblages across multiple valleys located in central Patagonia, in order to better constrain the dynamics of palaeo ice-lobe behaviour, and to develop new chronological datasets that quantify the timing of moraine formation, ice-cap unzipping and opening of continental drainage routes for this region of the former Patagonian Ice Sheet.