TC cover
Co-editors-in-chief: Caroline Clason, Chris Derksen, Christian Haas, Christian Hauck, Nanna Bjørnholt Karlsson, Hanna Lee & Thomas Mölg
eISSN: TC 1994-0424, TCD 1994-0440

The Cryosphere (TC) is a not-for-profit international scientific journal dedicated to the publication and discussion of research articles, short communications, and review papers on all aspects of frozen water and frozen ground on Earth and on other planetary bodies.

The main subject areas are ice sheets and glaciers, permafrost, river and lake ice, seasonal snow cover, and sea ice, including remote sensing, numerical modeling, in situ, and laboratory approaches, and studies of the interaction of the cryosphere with the Earth system. Manuscripts with a focus on cryospheric research that include perspectives from social science, humanities, and other disciplines outside the natural sciences are also welcome.

Journal metrics

TC is indexed in the Web of Science, Scopus, Google Scholar, etc. We refrain from displaying the journal metrics prominently on the landing page since citation metrics used in isolation do not describe importance, impact, or quality of a journal. However, these metrics can be found on the journal metrics page.

News

13 Feb 2026 University of Western Ontario partners with Copernicus Publications to support open-access publishing

Copernicus Publications has signed a new agreement with Western Libraries at the University of Western Ontario, providing a 50% APC reduction for eligible corresponding authors submitting from 1 January 2026. Please read more.

13 Feb 2026 University of Western Ontario partners with Copernicus Publications to support open-access publishing

Copernicus Publications has signed a new agreement with Western Libraries at the University of Western Ontario, providing a 50% APC reduction for eligible corresponding authors submitting from 1 January 2026. Please read more.

13 Feb 2026 University of Western Ontario partners with Copernicus Publications to support open-access publishing

Copernicus Publications has signed a new agreement with Western Libraries at the University of Western Ontario, providing a 50% APC reduction for eligible corresponding authors submitting from 1 January 2026. Please read more.

13 Feb 2026 University of Western Ontario partners with Copernicus Publications to support open-access publishing

Copernicus Publications has signed a new agreement with Western Libraries at the University of Western Ontario, providing a 50% APC reduction for eligible corresponding authors submitting from 1 January 2026. Please read more.

13 Feb 2026 Exploring the conditions conducive to convection within the Greenland Ice Sheet

Convection has been previously, yet contentiously, suggested for ice sheets, but never before comprehensively explored using numerical models. The authors use mantle dynamics code to test the hypothesis that convection gives rise to enigmatic plume-like features observed in radio-stratigraphy observations of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Please read more.

13 Feb 2026 Exploring the conditions conducive to convection within the Greenland Ice Sheet

Convection has been previously, yet contentiously, suggested for ice sheets, but never before comprehensively explored using numerical models. The authors use mantle dynamics code to test the hypothesis that convection gives rise to enigmatic plume-like features observed in radio-stratigraphy observations of the Greenland Ice Sheet. Please read more.

Recent papers

27 Apr 2026
Simulating the effect of natural convection in a tundra snow cover
Mahdi Jafari and Michael Lehning
The Cryosphere, 20, 2439–2467, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2439-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2439-2026, 2026
Short summary
27 Apr 2026
Impact of spatial resolution on large-scale ice cover modelling of mountainous regions
Helen Werner, Dirk Scherler, Tancrède P. M. Leger, Guillaume Jouvet, and Ricarda Winkelmann
The Cryosphere, 20, 2469–2484, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2469-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2469-2026, 2026
Short summary
27 Apr 2026
| Highlight paper
Review article: 30 years of airborne radar surveys on the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets by the Alfred Wegener Institute
Steven Franke, Daniel Steinhage, Veit Helm, Tobias Binder, Uwe Nixdorf, Heinrich Miller, Angelika Humbert, Daniela Jansen, Graeme Eagles, Hannes Eisermann, Wilfried Jokat, Antonia Ruppel, Reinhard Drews, Alexandra Zuhr, Amelie Driemel, Andreas Walter, Peter Konopatzky, Robin Heß, Antonie Haas, Roland Koppe, Pascal H. Andreas, and Olaf Eisen
The Cryosphere, 20, 2485–2530, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2485-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2485-2026, 2026
Short summary Editorial statement
27 Apr 2026
Numerical modeling on the mechanisms of chlorine chemistry in snowpack and their impact on secondary atmospheric pollution
Shengjin Xie, Xuelei Zhang, Aijun Xiu, Hong Qi, Shengrui Tong, Qianjie Chen, Chao Gao, Hongmei Zhao, Shichun Zhang, Stephen Dauda Yabo, Yiming Liu, Siting Li, and Mengduo Zhang
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-5338,https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-5338, 2026
Preprint under review for TC (discussion: open, 0 comments)
Short summary
27 Apr 2026
Lake Ice Thickness retrieval using TanDEM-X immediate interferometry
Peilin Chen, Grant Gunn, and Sukhdip Kharoud
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-1980,https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2026-1980, 2026
Preprint under review for TC (discussion: open, 0 comments)
Short summary

Highlight articles

27 Apr 2026
Review article: 30 years of airborne radar surveys on the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets by the Alfred Wegener Institute
Steven Franke, Daniel Steinhage, Veit Helm, Tobias Binder, Uwe Nixdorf, Heinrich Miller, Angelika Humbert, Daniela Jansen, Graeme Eagles, Hannes Eisermann, Wilfried Jokat, Antonia Ruppel, Reinhard Drews, Alexandra Zuhr, Amelie Driemel, Andreas Walter, Peter Konopatzky, Robin Heß, Antonie Haas, Roland Koppe, Pascal H. Andreas, and Olaf Eisen
The Cryosphere, 20, 2485–2530, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2485-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2485-2026, 2026
Short summary Editorial statement
13 Apr 2026
Results of the second Ice Shelf–Ocean Model Intercomparison Project (ISOMIP+)
Claire K. Yung, Xylar S. Asay-Davis, Alistair Adcroft, Christopher Y. S. Bull, Jan De Rydt, Michael S. Dinniman, Benjamin K. Galton-Fenzi, Daniel Goldberg, David E. Gwyther, Robert Hallberg, Matthew Harrison, Tore Hattermann, David M. Holland, Denise Holland, Paul R. Holland, James R. Jordan, Nicolas C. Jourdain, Kazuya Kusahara, Gustavo Marques, Pierre Mathiot, Dimitris Menemenlis, Adele K. Morrison, Yoshihiro Nakayama, Olga Sergienko, Robin S. Smith, Alon Stern, Ralph Timmermann, and Qin Zhou
The Cryosphere, 20, 2053–2088, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2053-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-2053-2026, 2026
Short summary Editorial statement
25 Mar 2026
The terrestrial ice margin morphology in Kalaallit Nunaat (Greenland)
Jakob Steiner, Jakob Abermann, and Rainer Prinz
The Cryosphere, 20, 1797–1814, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1797-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1797-2026, 2026
Short summary Editorial statement
13 Feb 2026
Exploring the conditions conducive to convection within the Greenland Ice Sheet
Robert Law, Andreas Born, Philipp Voigt, Joseph A. MacGregor, and Claire Marie Guimond
The Cryosphere, 20, 1071–1086, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1071-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1071-2026, 2026
Short summary Editorial statement
11 Feb 2026
Water vapour isotope anomalies during an atmospheric river event at Dome C, East Antarctica
Niels Dutrievoz, Cécile Agosta, Cécile Davrinche, Amaëlle Landais, Sebastien Nguyen, Étienne Vignon, Inès Ollivier, Christophe Leroy-Dos Santos, Elise Fourré, Mathieu Casado, Jonathan Wille, Vincent Favier, Bénédicte Minster, and Frédéric Prié
The Cryosphere, 20, 1025–1046, https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1025-2026,https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-20-1025-2026, 2026
Short summary Editorial statement

Notice on APC invoices

In accordance with current European restrictions, Copernicus Publications does not step into business relations with and issue APC invoices (articles processing charges) to Russian and Belarusian institutions. The peer-review process and scientific exchange of our journals including preprint posting is not affected. However, these restrictions require that the first contact (contractual partner of Copernicus) has an affiliation and invoice address outside Russia or Belarus.