Rapid landscape evolution at the permafrost-glacier interface

永久冻土覆盖了加拿大的大部分土地，在一些地方，大量的冰已经保存了数千年。然而，加拿大的大部分永久冻土正在融化，导致地面冰融化，景观和整体陆地环境发生了巨大变化。这导致了景观演化速度和特征的阶跃变化（一个临界点）——由于其复杂性，在气候变化影响预测中很少考虑到这一点。这在北极最为明显，那里的冰川正在迅速消退，产生了大量的融水，冲击着冻土和冰川周围的大量埋藏冰。其结果是，环境正在以我们从未见过的方式发生变化。四个相互关联的项目旨在更好地了解正在发生的变化：

Permafrost underlies a large portion of Canada's landscape and in some locations, massive amounts of ice have been preserved for thousands of years. However, much of the permafrost in Canada is thawing, resulting in the melt-out of ground ice and dramatic alterations to the landscape and overall terrestrial environment. This is resulting in a step change (a tipping point) in the rate and character of landscape evolution - something seldom taken into account in the climate change impact predictions due to its complexity. It is most obvious in the Arctic where glaciers are rapidly retreating, producing large volumes of melt water impacting the frozen ground and massive buried ice surrounding the glaciers. The result is an environment which is changing in ways we have not witnessed before. Four interrelated projects designed to better understand the changes occurring are: