thermokarst
Definitions
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
- noun A region similar in appearance to karst topography, characterized by an irregular land surface, with bogs, pits, and other depressions, formed in areas of permafrost due to ice melting.
Examples
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Similar features can be found in "thermokarst" landscapes in Alaska and elsewhere, where permafrost is melting to create lakes and streams.
New Images Suggest More Recent Lakes on Mars | Universe Today
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The susceptibility of permafrost to environmental hazards associated with thermokarst, ground settlement, and several other destructive cryogenic processes can be crudely evaluated using the geocryological hazard index, which is the combination of the projected percentage change in active-layer thickness and the ground ice content:
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The “thermokarst lakes,” as the water-filled ones are called, are bubbling with methane that had been trapped in the ice.
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The tundra was scored with weird geometric shapes — centuries-old ice wedges, ice-filled earthen mounds called pingos, thermokarst lakes trapped atop permafrost craters.
Note
The word 'thermokarst' comes from Greek roots meaning 'hot' and 'Karst', an area of eroded limestone, from German name for a region of modern Slovenia where this landscape is found.
