Scientists are calling for urgent monitoring of Antarctic ice shelves, as a new paper finds large areas of ice could lose their land-locked roots if as little as 5 to 13 per cent of the shelves were to disappear.

The paper, by researchers at Germany's Friedrich-Alexander-Universität, is one of the first to quantify the amount of floating ice an Antarctic ice shelf can lose without its grounded portion sliding into the ocean.

An ice shelf is a thick slab of ice which stretches out as an extension of an ice sheet.

Ice sheets are grounded on rock, formed over time through the accumulation of snowfall. When ice sheets melt they can contribute to sea level rise.



The floating portion of the ice shelves holds back or "buttresses" the ice sheet that lies on the sea floor, providing resistance and reducing the speed at which an ice sheet flows into the ocean.