Crystallographic preferred orientation (CPO) development governs strain weakening in ice: insights from high-temperature deformation experiments

Abstract

Strain weakening leads to the formation of high-strain shear zones and strongly influences terrestrial ice discharge. In glacial flow models, strain weakening is assumed to arise from the alignment of weak basal planes—the development of a crystallographic preferred orientation, CPO—during flow. However, in experiments, ice strain weakening also coincides with grain size reduction, which has been invoked as a weakening mechanism in other minerals. To interrogate the relative contributions of CPO development and grain size reduction toward ice strain weakening, we deformed initially isotropic polycrystalline ice samples to progressively higher strains between −4 and −30°C. Microstructural measurements were subsequently combined with flow laws to separately model the mechanical response expected to arise from CPO development and grain size reduction. Magnitudes of strain weakening predicted by the constitutive flow laws were then compared with the experimental measurements. Flow laws that only consider grain size do not predict weakening with strain despite grain size reduction. In contrast, flow laws solely considering CPO effects can reproduce the measured strain weakening. Thus, it is reasonable to assume that strain weakening in ice is dominated by CPO development, at least under high temperature (Th ≥ 0.9) and high stress (>1 MPa), like those in our experiments. We speculate that at high homologous temperatures (Th ≥ 0.9), CPO development will also govern the strain weakening behavior of other viscously anisotropic minerals, like olivine and quartz. Overall, we emphasize that geodynamic and glaciological models should incorporate CPOs to account for strain weakening, especially at high homologous temperatures.