Abstract

Marine geological studies provide a record of diachronous expansion and retreat of the Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet, West Antarctic Ice Sheet and East Antarctic Ice Sheet during the past c. 30 000 cal yr BP. Retreat of these ice sheets and Antarctica’s contribution to sea-level rise was largely complete by the early Holocene. Estimates of ice sheet thickness, based on maximum grounding depths, range from 640 to 1640 m on the inner continental shelf. Grounding depths on the outer continental shelf equate to minimum thicknesses of 410–950 m. Geomorphic features indicate that retreat from the continental shelf was mostly step-wise around the continent, a result of the different factors that control ice sheet behaviour and the degree to which these factors vary regionally. Thus, the nature of post-LGM (Last Glacial Maximum) sea-level rise was episodic and believed to have been punctuated by rapid pulses triggered by individual ice stream collapse. Most of these pulses would have been of sub-metre magnitudes and below the resolution of existing sea-level curves, but they would have had significant impact on coastal evolution, especially along low-gradient coasts.