The Forum for Research into Ice Shelf Processes (FRISP) aims to coordinate the community engaged in research on the glaciological, oceanic and atmospheric processes governing the behaviour of ice shelves that are key to the ice sheet contribution to sea level change.

The Forum for Research into Ice Shelf Processes (FRISP) was first developed by SCAR in 1983, with a specific geographical focus on the Filchner‐Ronne Ice Shelf.  It later broadened its scope to the whole of Antarctica and Greenland. In 2016, it was confirmed as an Expert Group under the SCAR Physical Sciences Group to focus on the glaciological, oceanic and atmospheric processes governing the behaviour of ice shelves that are key to the ice sheet contribution to sea level change.

This Expert Group is distinct from and complementary to the existing ISMASS Expert Group in that FRISP concentrates on the processes controlling ice shelf behaviour, whereas ISMASS is broadly concerned with the ice sheet contribution to sea level rise.  The scientific focus of FRISP naturally puts its activities at the interface between those of ISMASS, SORP and SOOS, while complementing the efforts of MISOMIP, and the FRISP Steering Committee includes representatives from the Steering Committees of those groups. Establishment of further links with other relevant SCAR groups, such as ASPeCt and AntClim21 will also be explored.

Mission Statement

FRISP exists to promote inter‐disciplinary scientific research into the interactions between the Earth’s ice sheets and oceans. 

Understanding those interactions is critical to reducing uncertainty in projections of the future sea level contribution from the ice sheets and in quantifying the impacts of the associated freshwater input on the state of the ocean and climate.

FRISP recognises the need for a whole Earth System approach to the study of ice‐sheet‐ocean interactions that encompasses the atmosphere‐ice‐ocean dynamics that control the delivery of ocean waters to the ice sheet margins and the atmosphere and ice dynamics that control the delivery of ice and meltwater to the ocean.

FRISP aims to promote international collaboration, to enhance the coordination of field programmes, and to encourage the participation of all, especially early‐career scientists, in an informal and open forum for scientific discussion.