JOAN CARTAN-HANSEN, HOST: : Glaciers have a big impact on the whole world, but there's a lot we don't know about how they work.

Let's follow some glacier scientists as they surge into research.

(SCIENCE TREK MUSIC) JUKES LIU, GEOSCIENCES GRADUATE STUDENT, BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY: Hi.

ENDERLIN: I think we should wait to put the sensors on until we have it on the pole.

LIU: So, I study glaciers in Alaska and Greenland and I'm working to understand how they're changing with changes in climate nowadays CARTAN-HANSEN: Jukes Liu is a graduate student at Boise State University.

She, her team leader, Assistant Professor Ellyn Enderlin and colleagues are studying why glaciers surge.

LIU: A surge is a special event on a glacier where it goes from its typical slow flow to really fast flow 10 times faster than normal CARTAN-HANSEN: They're studying Sít' Kusá or Turner glacier in Southeastern Alaska.

LIU: Sít' Kusá is really special because it has a really short surge cycle of eight years.

That's the shortest cycle for surging known in the world.

ELLYN ENDERLIN, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF GEOSCIENCES, BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY: It gave us this really great opportunity for us to go out and put instruments at the glacier and combine that with all of these satellite data sets and try to figure out what's going on, what causes these surges.

CARTAN-HANSEN: So, how do you study a glacier 20 miles long?

ENDERLIN: So what we did was we have glacier instruments, we have ones that are on the ice, and then we have ones that are next to the ice.

And so the ones that are next to the ice are a bunch of seismometers.

So those are recording shakings of the earth or just things nearby.

In this case, we want to know about shaking of the earth due to water flowing beneath the glacier We also have two cameras that are out at the end of the glacier and they are taking photos of the glacier really regularly.

Then we also have GPS units.

And so that tells us how they're, how it's moving, how it's flowing, um, but also if its surface elevation is moving up and down.

CARTAN-HANSEN: Each summer, the team checks existing sensors and collects data and then puts in new instruments to gather more information.

ENDERLIN: It's always challenging to work on a glacier.

It is obviously a really dangerous location.

LIU: Problems that can happen that we find when we get there range from anything like the batteries are not connected anymore to a bear, has chewed up a cable and it's not transmitting data to the computer anymore.

And so, we have to be really flexible when we're out.

CARTAN-HANSEN: The team works in pairs in different locations on different days.

They use a helicopter to get to around.

The next day, Liu's task is to fix one of the instruments.

LIU: When we found this seismometer, it was a little bit leaned over.

And it measures motion in three directions, so we really want it upright to make sure we have the right reference for our data.

ENDERLIN: For this project, we're really hoping that we get a good idea of what's going on beneath the glacier.

And that's important not only for this like one to 2% of glaciers worldwide that have these surges, but we know that there are these instability that even bigger glaciers.

So the Antarctic ice sheet can have these instability where suddenly the ice flows really quickly and is driven by something going on at the base.

And so we're really hoping to get a, a good idea of what goes on at this particular glacier and that that will help tell us about what is going on at all of these glaciers that can have these sorts of instability.

CARTAN-HANSEN: The team will take the data collected on the glacier and bring it back to Boise.

There, they analyze the information.

LIU: So, we've learned from all these different instruments and all the satellite data that we've gotten that this glacier actually changes in speed a lot.

Not just every eight years when it surges, but every year in the winter it actually speeds up.

And that's really strange.

And we think it has to do with water flowing through the glacier and being stored inside the glacier over winter that then makes it to the bottom and makes the glacier slide more easily over the winter.

CARTAN-HANSEN: The team now has some of the most detailed records of glacial motion of any glacier in the world.

What they've discovered may apply to glaciers all over the earth.

LIU: Scientists are trying to better understand how glaciers are going to change moving into the future.

And so in order to predict how these glaciers will affect the global climate system in the future, we need to understand how they work.

CARTAN-HANSEN: And understanding all this is especially important because climate change is causing glaciers to disappear.

ENDERLIN: When we lose our glaciers, we absorb more of the sun's energy and then that causes the atmosphere to warm even more.

And also as we pump out more water into the oceans, that can influence our ocean circulation as well, which also controls climate.

And so there are these really big picture things that people often don't talk about.

They normally focus on sea level rise, which is important if you're in a coastal community.

But for the rest of us, there are lots of other things that even if we don't live near a glacier, these glaciers can have a really big impact on us overall.

CARTAN-HANSEN: Work on Sít' Kusá isn't done.

They'll be back next summer to monitor any changes and see what else they can find out.

Scientific discovery, that's one of the reasons why Liu and Enderlin became geoscientists.

LIU: I've always really been interested in the environment.

I've always loved being outdoors.

And so studying glaciers and how they're changing with climate and how they affect the landscapes around them feels to me like a way to give back to nature and help conserve it for future generations.

CARTAN-HANSEN: If you want to learn more about glaciers, check out the Science Trek website.

You'll find it at ScienceTrek.org.

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