Ella Fernie Wood

I am a co-taught PhD student between the University of St Andrews and the University of Bonn, currently based in St Andrews. My PhD research is on the hydrological significance of rock glaciers in the Kazakh Tien Shan in Central Asia. Rock glaciers are landforms composed of a mixture of ice and debris and are a common feature of the mountain cryosphere around the world. They are thought to be a potentially significant store of ice in arid mountain environments, however, ice storage within rock glaciers is very poorly constrained, so their hydrological contribution is currently unaccounted for. Greater understanding of the hydrological role of rock glaciers is needed for assessing mountain water resources and to understand future hydrological changes as a response to climate change.

My research looks the relationships between rock glacier surface flow and their internal composition and structure, to investigate how ice storage within rock glaciers can be quantified. This combines remote sensing observations of rock glacier flow with geophysical data on rock glacier internal structure. I am working alongside the Kazakh Institute for Geography and Water Security in Almaty and am also a part of the St Andrews Glaciology Group and the MountCryo Research Group.