Iceland Rising - The nation of Iceland is literally rising - a new research has revealed that as a result of the melting of great ice caps on the Nordic island due to global warming, the earth crust underneath it is rising and rebounding at a fast rate.
According to a new study conducted by a team of geologists from the University of Arizona, "the current fast uplift of the Icelandic crust is a result of accelerated melting of the island's glaciers."
Reports indicate that some regions of the country are most affected, specifically sites in south-central Iceland are shooting upward by as much as 1.4 inches per year.
The results of the study, which is scheduled to be published in an upcoming edition of Geophysical Research Letters, was arrived at after researchers gathered data from 62 global positioning system receivers mounted in different parts if the island.
"We used 62 GPS stations located all across the island of Iceland, and looked at how fast those GPS stations were moving upward through time," said first author Kathleen Compton.
"They're not only moving upward very rapidly in the central and southern part of the island, but they're speeding up over time- moving faster and faster each year."
"Iceland is the first place we can say accelerated uplift means accelerated ice mass loss," said co-author of the study, Richard Bennett, a professor at the University of Arizona.
Reports indicate that the research is the first to connect the current pace of the Icelandic earth crust rebounding to the rapid melting of the island's glaciers, which concurs with the onslaught of warming that began 30 years ago.
"Our research makes the connection between recent accelerated uplift and the accelerated melting of the Icelandic ice caps, "Compton said.
Researchers say Iceland rising could increase the frequency of volcanic eruptions in the country.
