Recent Projects
Unconfined Aquifers
If the polar ice-caps continue to melt at an increasing rate, we wondered if the ocean currents will change course as more cold fresh water is released into the ocean system restricting or eliminating the current mixing patterns of ocean to atmospheric weather we have today.
Outburst Flow
About 8,000 to 10,000 years ago the Laurentide Ice sheet covered most of North America. At about this time global temperatures began to rise and the glacier began its slow melt and retreat northward towards Canada. This melt-water collected into enormous cold, fresh-water lakes; after a series of outbursts, the water eventually drained from these glacial lakes. The present day St. Laurence seaway and Mississippi river channels are remnants of these very cold, fast moving glacial outbursts of melt water.
Waves
This cold, fresh-water eventually poured into the ocean and triggered a change in ocean currents by cutting off, or confining these currents. This drastic change in paleo-ocean currents ignited significant global climate change and ultimately ended the last ice age. However, if the polar ice-caps continue to melt at an increasing rate, we wondered if the ocean currents will change course as more cold fresh water is released into the ocean system restricting or eliminating the current mixing patterns of ocean to atmospheric weather we have today.
To see more of the work done with the Flume Lab, please visit: http://elearning.winona.edu/geoscience/projects/index.htm.