Radar-icy regolith interactions at the McGill Arctic Research Station (MARS) at Axel Heiberg Island

请拨资金支持与我提交的NSERC发现拨款提案有关的实地项目，该提案名为“雷达遥感和行星表面地质分析”。该提案中概述的项目之一是野外探地雷达(GPR)调查，旨在了解极地沙漠地形中雷达信号和冰层之间的相互作用。这项工作将在努纳武特(Nunavut)中轴海贝格岛(79.4°N，90.8°W)。这项工作的目的是量化雷达信号与各种富含冰的地质材料之间的相互作用，这些地质材料可以作为行星材料的类似物。尽管许多研究已经将雷达作为遥感工具来搜索和表征地球和其他行星上的浅层地下冰，但需要在偏振雷达上系统地研究各种形式的地面冰的相位特征。这对于研究火星表面和近地表材料尤其重要，因为在这些地方，由于温度和压力较低，很可能有大量的水以地面冰的形式占据浅层地下。穿透雷达与其他地球物理技术相结合，已被证明在表征地球上浅层地下物质方面极其有效，国际火星界成员对开发火星着陆的探地雷达系统非常感兴趣。除了行星社区，我的结果对于涉及北部社区发展的实际应用也将是重要的，在那里，对地面冰的性质的了解是减轻热岩溶[40]和类似现象影响的关键。最后，我将最终寻求利用我的结果开发一种方法，用于检测大面积地面冰的分布和性质的长期变化；如果这一方法成功，它将提供一种新的方式来监测全球气候变化对北部地区的影响。

Funds are requested to support the field project associated with my submitted NSERC Discovery Grant proposal entitled, "Radar remote sensing and geological analysis of planetary surfaces."  One of the projects outlined in that proposal is a field-based ground-penetrating radar (GPR) investigation, aimed at understanding the interactions between radar signals and icy regolith in polar desert terrains.  This work will be conducted at the McGill Arctic Research Station (MARS), located 8 km inland at Expedition Fiord, on Central Axel Heiberg Island in Nunavut (79.4° N, 90.8° W).  The objective of this work is to quantify the interactions of radar signals with various ice-rich geological materials that can serve as analogues to planetary materials.  Though many studies have used radar as a remote sensing tool to search for and characterize shallow subsurface ice on Earth and other planets, a systematic investigation of the phase signatures of ground ice in various forms on polarimetric radar is needed.  This is particularly important for studies of Martian surface and near-surface materials, where, because of the low temperatures and pressures, it is likely that a significant volume of water occupies the shallow subsurface in the form of ground ice. Penetrating radar, combined with other geophysical techniques, has been shown to be extremely effective at characterizing shallow subsurface materials on Earth, and there is much interest among members of the international Mars community in developing a landed GPR system for Mars. Beyond the planetary community, my results will also be important for practical applications involving development in northern communities, where an understanding of the nature of ground ice is key to mitigating the effects of thermokarst [40] and similar phenomena.  Finally, I will ultimately seek to use my results to develop a method for detecting long-term changes in the distribution and nature of ground ice over large areas; if this is successful, it would provide a new way to monitor the effects of global climate change in northern regions.