Fig. 3: Correlation between subglacial flux, ice shelf basal melting, and ocean conditions.

a Correlation between timeseries of Thermocline depth (Therm. D.), Subglacial flux (SGL flux), Thwaites basal melt anomaly (T. m.a.), and Pine Island Glacier basal melt anomaly (PIG m.a.) as shown in Fig. 2 of the main manuscript. Numbers in insets give the values of the Pearson correlation coefficients. P values suggest that the Thwaites basal melt anomaly and the Subglacial flux timeseries (Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.60) have a significant correlation (P value of 7e⁻⁹). Basal melt anomalies under PIG and Thwaites are weakly correlated over the entire period and with a P value of 6e⁻³. b A lag analysis suggests increased correlation between the subglacial flux and Thwaites’ basal melt rates shifted backward in time by three months, the Pearson correlation increases from 0.60 to 0.77 with a P value of 5e⁻¹⁶ (top right plot). Accounting for a three-month lag (Fig. S10), the relationship between Thwaites‘ basal melt and the subglacial flux is well approximated by a power law (dashed line) of exponent 0.52 (95% confidence interval [0.29 0.75]). Source data are provided as a Source Data file.