为更好的理解"全球海平面变化的物理机制"这一科学问题，本研究提出联合多种空间大地测量技术定量分析和研究全球山岳冰川的质量平衡问题。研究突破传统冰川变化监测技术的局限，结合近年来空间大地测量技术的进展，联合卫星测高、卫星重力以及卫星遥感等多种技术资料精确测定山岳冰川的边界及覆盖面积、监测冰川表面高程的变化，进而精确获得全球山岳冰川质量平衡的变化量，并探讨山岳冰川变化对全球海平面变化的影响。这对我们深入认识全球海平面变化的物理机制以及未来应对措施具有非常重要的作用。

Shrinking mountain glaciers and ice caps, and their seasonally delayed melt water feeding the world's major rivers can significantly affect the stability of freshwater availability especially under anthropogenic climate change. The Asian High Mountain (AHM) glaciated system includes China's Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and borders eight countries. The AHM glaciers and snow covers are sources of 19 of the world's major rivers, bringing water resource to 3 billion people, or 43% of the world's population. It is important to understand the current state of these other glaciers and ice caps in China and in the world. The current knowledge of the contributions of mountain glaciers and ice caps to present-day sea-level rise has a wide range: from 0.55 to 1.4 mm/yr equivalent sea-level rise, and the discrepancy represents a significant amount of freshwater wastage of 304 Gton/yr. We propose to provide an improved quantification of the world's mountain glacier mass balance estimate using a suite of radar altimeter data, not widely used before for glaciers, including CryoSat-2 radar interferometric (SARIn) or SAR altimetry, GRACE gravimetry and ICESat laser altimetry, towards narrowing the uncertainty of mountain glacier's contribution to sea-level rise. Our approaches include: (1) the use of SAR (TerraSAR-X, SRTM-X, ASTER/SRTM-C, ALOS) and CryoSat-2 SARIn radar waveform, along with the new Randolph Glacier Inventory (V2.0) for classifying especially rock glaciers in the AHM glacier regions, to improve the estimates the total glaciated areas needed for computing mass balance, (2) development of land waveform retracking techniques for SARIn/SAR/LRM CryoSat-2, and historic historic and current radar altimeter data (TOPEX, Envisat, Jason-2, AltiKa, HY-2A) to improve glacier elevation retrieval, (3) the use of GRACE gravimetry and ICESat to supplement radar altimetry glacier mass balance time series, (4) the use of ERA-Interim SMB, temperature (MODIS), and if applicable GRACE to estimate firn cmpaction/ice column density corrections, and to mitigate radar penetration errors, (5) to validate resulting mass balance time series using in situ data, other altimeter data and GRACE and to obtain uncertainty estimates. The anticipated results include the generation of a long term, validated and integrated records of radar altimetry, GRACE, and ICESat elevation change, and quantification of the mass balance for the world's mountain glacier systems and ice caps, including China's Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau glacier systems.