Editors’ Highlights are summaries of recent papers by AGU’s journal editors.
Source: AGU Advances
The Arctic is warming faster than the rest of Earth’s land surface, and Arctic rivers draining permafrost regions have increased in streamflow and export of carbon. Predicting how warming is impacting complex geomorphic systems like river floodplains requires fundamental understanding of how permafrost forms, thaws, and evolves over time. However, the dynamics of these processes have not been studied in detail.
To better understand the fate of permafrost in a warming world, Douglas et al. [2024] explore the interactions between river migration, vegetation, and permafrost development along the Koyukuk River in Alaska. Arctic rivers continually rework their floodplains, eroding permafrost from one riverbank while depositing unfrozen sediment on the opposite bank. The authors show that permafrost forms in the newly deposited sediment within a few decades, in concert with vegetation succession. Over thousands of years, permafrost continues to accumulate as insulating mosses develop. Modeling how these processes would change in a warmer climate show either slower or no permafrost formation, with consequences for hydrology and organic matter degradation in these systems.
Citation: Douglas, M. M., Li, G. K., West, A. J., Ke, Y., Rowland, J. C., Brown, N., et al. (2024). Permafrost formation in a meandering river floodplain. AGU Advances, 5, e2024AV001175. https://doi.org/10.1029/2024AV001175
—Susan Trumbore, Editor-in-Chief, AGU Advances
