Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1-2007
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.1029/2006GL027081
Abstract
Motions of three hundred and sixty Global Positioning System (GPS) sites in Canada and the United States yield a detailed image of the vertical and horizontal velocity fields within the nominally stable interior of the North American plate. By far the strongest signal is the effect of glacial isostatic adjustment (GIA) due to ice mass unloading during deglaciation. Vertical velocities show present-day uplift (∼10 mm/yr) near Hudson Bay, the site of thickest ice at the last glacial maximum. The uplift rates generally decrease with distance from Hudson Bay and change to subsidence (1–2 mm/yr) south of the Great Lakes. The “hinge line” separating uplift from subsidence is consistent with data from water level gauges along the Great Lakes, showing uplift along the northern shores and subsidence along the southern ones. Horizontal motions show outward motion from Hudson Bay with complex local variations especially in the far field. Although the vertical motions are generally consistent with the predictions of GIA models, the horizontal data illustrate the need and opportunity to improve the models via more accurate descriptions of the ice load and laterally variable mantle viscosity.
Rights Information
Was this content written or created while at USF?
No
Citation / Publisher Attribution
Geophysical Research Letters, v. 34, issue 2, art. L02306
Copyright 2007 by the American Geophysical Union.
Scholar Commons Citation
Sella, Giovanni F.; Stein, Seth; Dixon, Timothy H.; Craymer, Michael; James, Thomas S.; Mazzotti, Stephane; and Dokka, Roy K., "Observation of Glacial Isostatic Adjustment in “Stable” North America with GPS" (2007). School of Geosciences Faculty and Staff Publications. 447.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/geo_facpub/447
Table S1.txt (42 kB)
GPS velocities in North America in IGb00 and residual velocities after removal of the motion of rigid North America
