 |
Fiona Clerc Assistant Professor as of January 2026 B.Sc., McGill University, 2017
PhD, MIT/WHOI Joint Program in Oceanography, 2022 Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, 2022-24 Postdoctoral Researcher, Stanford University, 2024-25 Faculty member at Stony Brook University as of January 2026 |
I am looking to grow my group with students and a postdoc,
please get in touch if you are interested in joining.
My research uses simple models to study physical processes within the Earth’s cryosphere and solid Earth, and their connections. To better understand these respective systems, I study direct interactions between ice sheets and Earth’s mantle/crust, as well as leverage theory and numerical tools describing similarities in the flow of rock and ice to address key uncertainties in the future stability of modern ice sheets. My research investigates the following questions:
1) Ice sheet instabilities, ice shelves, and calving in Antarctica: Does the evolution of fractures on ice sheets and ice shelves beget further fracturing, and what are the implications for mass loss through the Marine Ice Cliff Instability? How do pinning points influence ice shelf stability and calving?
2) Climate-tectonic feedbacks, geothermal heat flux, and subglacial groundwater: Are there feedbacks between ice sheet retreat and the geothermal heat flux imparted by the solid Earth to the base of the ice? How does subglacial groundwater modulate this heat flux?
3) Magmatism, glacial loading, and the carbon cycle: How does glacial loading influence magmatic activity, and what insight can this provide into the transit of partial melts from the mantle? How does mantle magmatism control the flux of CO 2 from solid Earth to surface?
Please see my website for additional information on my research, and my google scholar page for a current list of publications.