Estimating Seasonal and Interannual Variability in Glaciers of The High Mountains Asia Surrounding the Tarim Basin

Glaciers play a crucial role in regulating hydrological systems. We integrated multisource satellite altimetry data (e.g., ICESat, ICESat-2, Cryosat-2) to derive high-temporal-resolution time series of glacier surface elevation spanning the past two decades across High Mountain Asia surrounding the Tarim Basin (HMA-TB) and analyzed the variability of annual and seasonal glacier elevation changes. We find that glaciers experience great thickening from winter to spring, with the thickening in spring exceeding that in winter. Geographically, this thickening gradually decreases from the west to the east of HMA-TB. Thinning primarily occurs in summer and autumn, with autumn thinning surpassing summer thinning. Geographically, this thinning also gradually decreases from the west to the east. A discernible shift in glacier dynamics is observed in the HMA-TB during the period 2003-2022. The rate of glacier thinning is decelerating in northern HMA-TB, while simultaneously, glaciers in the southern HMA-TB are experiencing a slowdown in thickening. Meanwhile, the western glaciers are undergoing an accelerated rate of thinning, becoming the region with the fastest glacier loss across HMA-TB. Furthermore, an anomalous accumulation of glaciers has been observed in the Tarim Basin in the past five years.