Atmospheric WAter Cycle over Antarctica: past, present and future

Climate models predict that precipitation will increase in Antarctica, which will moderate global sea-level rise. Meanwhile, the isotopic composition of snowfall records climate parameters which can be recovered in ice cores. However, there are still major gaps in our understanding of the atmospheric water cycle over Antarctica. This project is to deploy and operate over several years automated observation platforms at 5 sites along a 1100 km coast-to-plateau transect aligned with the typical moisture-carrying air mass trajectories, which turn out to align well with the Dumont d’Urville – Dome C logistical route. Resulting data set will make possible the study of the processes driving the water fluxes and composition to an unprecedented level, and the gained insights will be a strong basis to develop new physics parameterizations for regional and climate models. Once validated along the transect but also in other regions of Antarctica thanks to satellite observations and past campaigns, those models will enable us to decipher the past and future variability of the atmospheric water cycle over Antarctica. The challenges of operating a range of high-end instruments in full autonomy in Antarctica, never addressed to such an extent before, will
will be tackled by collaborating with experts in polar technology and logistics including and in particular with IPEV logistical and technical support and Godon Polar Engineering (GPE) in Brest.