The Response of Glaciers to Global Warming in the Mountains of Eastern Siberia, Mongolia, and Northwest China

Abstract—The use of diverse, multi-temporal satellite space information has become the main approach in investigating the current status of mountain glaciers. We have accumulated large archives of satellite images of snow–glacial systems on Earth with different spatial resolutions over the past 50 years. Together with the previously created topographic maps displaying glaciers, glacier catalogs, special maps, and atlases of ice and snow, they provide data to determine changes in areas, lengths, volumes, and altitudes of glaciers during the current climate warming. In 1986, the World Glacier Monitoring Service (WGMS) was founded to monitor glacier fluctuations in different regions of the Earth. However, the number of observation sites is limited. The Global Ground Glacier Observing Network mainly includes those glaciers where we previously conducted ground-based studies of glacier front fluctuations, mass balance measurements, measurements of meteorological parameters, ice flow velocities, and ablation features. To identify regional differences, different altitude and plan locations, the influence of permafrost, and the background landscape environment requires that data on a larger number of glaciers be analyzed. Therefore, groups of researchers from Irkutsk and Beijing began to study the dynamics of glaciers in the inland regions of Eurasia within the framework of international projects. Several glaciers were selected in the mountains of the south of Eastern Siberia, the Mongolian Altai, and the eastern part of the Tien Shan. We recorded current glacier fronts and their elevations. The lengths and areas of glaciers in the early 1970s and early 2000s and their current state were determined. In recent decades, some connections between the dynamics of glaciers and changes in meteorological parameters have been revealed.