The European Space Agency's GOCE satellite has revealed the effect of Antarctic ice loss on the Earth's gravity.
GOCE is not designed to map out changes in the Earth's gravity, but after doubling its planned orbit it has spent almost four years measuring these variations in "unprecedented" detail.
Researchers now have the most accurate gravity model ever produced which, will help them gain insight into the inner workings of our planet. The strength of gravity on Earth's surface can be influenced by factors such as the planet's rotation, the position of mountains and ocean trenches, and changes in the mass of ice sheets.
Researchers found the decrease in the mass of ice between 2009 and 2012 matched up with gravity data picked up by GOCE. The information was analyzed by scientists from the German Geodetic Research Institute, Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands, the U.S. Jet Propulsion Lab and the Technical University of Munich in Germany.
The Antarctic ice sheet is divided into catchment basins to make it easier for scientists to take comparative measurements, and some of these basins are much larger than others. The make their findings the researchers combined GOCE's high-resolution measurements with information from the NASA-German Grace satellite which has been taking gravity measurements for over a decade. These findings allowed the researchers to look at how changes in ice mass affect glacial systems, providing even more insight into these basins and how they discharge ice into the ocean.
The study's findings suggest ice lost from West Antarctica between 2009 and 2012 caused a dip in gravity over the region. ESA's CryoSat satellite recently determined the ice loss rate in West Antarctica has increased three-fold since 2009.
"We are now working in an interdisciplinary team to extend the analysis of GOCE's data to all of Antarctica," Johannes Bouman from the German Geodetic Research Institute said. "This will help us gain further comparison with results from CryoSat for an even more reliable picture of actual changes in ice mass."
