The Antarctic Ice Sheet and the bed beneath it, rendered in 3D from BedMachine topography

Yu Wang 王禹

Modeling the ice we may yet hold back

Climate Systems Engineering initiative
The University of Chicago

Research Explore 3D ICE
About

About Me

Yu Wang (王禹) is a postdoctoral scholar in glaciology at The University of Chicago. My research uses numerical models to investigate Antarctic ice dynamics, subglacial hydrology, and ice–ocean interactions, and to assess proposed glacial climate interventions aimed at slowing ice loss and its contribution to sea-level rise.

During weekdays, I model ice sheets on supercomputers; on weekends, you’ll often find me outdoors on hiking trails, climbing routes, badminton and tennis courts, or by the shoreline with a camera (or a fishing rod).

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Interests
  • Antarctic ice dynamics
  • Ice sheet / ice shelf modeling
  • Subglacial hydrology
  • Glacial climate intervention
  • Climate and sea-level change
  • Ice–ocean interactions
Education

  • PhD (Marine and Antarctic Studies)

    Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania, AU

  • BSc (Hons) (Marine and Antarctic Science)

    Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania, AU

  • BSc (Marine Science)

    College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, CN

Research

Understand the ice first. Then ask whether we can slow it.

Ice sheets are hard to predict. Much of what controls them happens out of sight, at a bed buried under kilometers of ice, and the processes our models simplify can amplify ice loss or hold it back. I want to understand that system well enough to say how fast it could change — and then to ask, honestly, whether anything we do could slow it.

01

What are our models still missing?

Grounding lines retreating over deepening beds, water reorganizing beneath the ice, ice shelves holding back the flow — leave one out and projected ice loss can change several-fold or grow substantially. I want to know which feedbacks matter most, where retreat becomes irreversible, and how much of the uncertainty we can actually reduce.

Elmer/Ice · GlaDS · WilkesMIP · ISMIP6

02

Can we change what happens at the bed?

If water at the bed lets ice slide faster, removing it looks like an obvious lever. But the drainage system is not passive: it reorganizes, and in coupled simulations it can partly undo the intervention. I want to find out when drying the bed could work, when it cannot, and why.

Coupled Elmer/Ice–GlaDS · Bed-drying experiments

03

Could we keep the ice shelves holding?

Much of Antarctica’s ice loss begins where warm ocean water reaches its ice shelves. Proposals to block that water or to reinforce the shelves are now being taken seriously. At CSEi, I want to test them with the same models we use for projections: how much ice they could save, how long they would take to work, and what they would cost in risk and scale.

CSEi · Ice–ocean modeling

Ice and water, evolving together. A coupled ice-sheet and subglacial hydrology simulation: channel discharge and ice velocity change in step as the drainage system reorganizes beneath the retreating ice.
Featured Publications
Dynamic instability of the Wilkes Subglacial Basin Ice Sheet, East Antarctica
Sensitivity of the future evolution of the Wilkes Subglacial Basin ice sheet to grounding-line melt parameterizations
Thermal structure of the Amery Ice Shelf from borehole observations and simulations
Co-authored Publications
Johanna Beckmann, Ronja Reese, Felicity S. McCormack, Sue Cook, Lawrence Bird, Dawid Gwyther, Daniel Richards, Matthias Scheiter, Yu (Eddie) Wang, Helene Seroussi, Ayako Abe-Ouchi, ..., Chen Zhao, Thomas Zwinger (2025). Disentangling uncertainty in ISMIP6 Antarctic sub-shelf melting and 2300 sea level rise projections. EGUsphere preprint.
PDF Source Document DOI
Chen Zhao, Rupert Gladstone, Thomas Zwinger, Florent Gillet-Chaulet, Yu (Eddie) Wang, Joris Caillet, Pierre Mathiot, Lauri Saraste, Eliot Jager, Ben K. Galton-Fenzi, Poul Christoffersen, Matt A. King (2025). Subglacial water amplifies Antarctic contributions to sea-level rise. Nat. Commun..
PDF DOI
Hélène Seroussi, Thibaut Pelle, William H. Lipscomb, Ayako Abe-Ouchi, Thomas Albrecht, Jorge Alvarez-Solas, ..., Yu (Eddie) Wang, Thomas Zwinger (2024). Evolution of the Antarctic Ice Sheet over the next three centuries from an ISMIP6 model ensemble. Earth’s Future.
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Explore my work & get in touch

I’m always keen to discuss Antarctica, modeling and glaciology. If you’d like to collaborate or invite a talk, feel free to reach out.
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