Theres no denying that celebrity weight-loss stories can be totally inspiring, especially since Adeles recent 100-pound weight loss story has inspired us to finally commit to our own health goals this year.

And now, Jessica Simpson seems to be the latest celebrity to share her weight loss success story, as her nutritionist Liz Josefburg recently shared with Hollywood Life that the singer dropped an impressive 100 pounds of baby weight in just six months.

So how did she do it? Josefburg credits Simpsons weight loss success to practicing moderation and mindful eating by eating regular meals (three meals a day) throughout the day, including a snack. And aside from choosing walking as a form of exercise, Jessica's nutritionist also credited her weight loss to drinking a lot of water.

While Josefburgs plan definitely helped Simpson shed weight quickly, registered dietitian Brittany Modell, MS, RD, CDN, says that it might not be suitable for everyone, especially since celebrities like Jessica Simpson often have personal chefs, personal trainers, and health coaches around-the-clock to make losing weight easier.

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But thats not to say that she is agreeance with Josefburgs approach to indulging mindfully, as its something she recommends to her own clients in order to create a sustainable lifestyle. Among ways to practice mindfulness: learning to enjoy what you are eating, and practicing not to use terms of guilt (good foods or bad foods) when it comes to food. Rather than saying a certain food item is bad, try to reframe your mindset and think about it a different way, Modell says. Try asking yourself how will this food make me feel in an hour (or two hours), and if this food will give me energy, or make me feel tired later on in the day?

Modell is also in agreeance Josefburgs approach to upping your water while embarking on any kind of weight loss journey loss, as she says that consuming water (alongside a high-fiber diet) can definitely keep you satiated throughout the day. However, she strongly advises against filling yourself up water just to lose weight, as calories are very crucial to human health.

In short, Modell says that there are positive takeaways from Simpsons diet. These include having three meals and a snack throughout the day (a great way to keep energy up and metabolism running efficiently, she explains), along with hydrating yourself with a sufficient amount of water. However, she reiterated the importance of remembering that just because a diet plan worked for a celebrity, doesnt mean it will automatically work for you. Drastic weight loss can be associated with concerning low-calorie plans, she adds, which can leave you deficient in important nutrients.

In order to lose 100 pounds in six months, one must be on a very restrictive, low-calorie plan, she says. My concern with rapid weight loss is that if it is not done healthfully or sustainably, it might result in malnutrition or nutrient deficiencies, as a person experiencing it may not be meeting their nutritional needs. Instead, she advises losing weight gradually by focusing on whole foods, eating enough calories to sustain your metabolism and body, hydrating your body and incorporating some form of movement into your life. Plus, youll always want to be remember to be patient with yourself, she adds, as drastic weight loss doesnt happen overnight.

Small changes that take place over a long period of time are often more sustainable, so be patient, she suggests.

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Jessica Simpson's Nutritionist Shares the Diet That Helped Her Lose 100 Pounds - NewBeauty Magazine

So many noticeable things happen when you lose weight your clothes fit better, you have more energy and you may even feel more confident. But what is actually happening inside your body when the scale ticks down?

The benefits of losing 10 pounds go far beyond appearance.

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Well, quite a lot, as it turns out. And these positive changes might start sooner than you think. In fact, when you lose just 10 pounds especially if you're overweight it can kickstart a whole host of bodily shifts toward better health.

To fully understand the biology of weight loss would take the equivalent of 30 semester hours. To save you the trouble of enrolling in university, here's a brief explanation of what's really happening in your body during the early stages of weight loss and the benefits of losing 10 pounds.

You gain weight when you eat more calories than your body needs to support its basic functions think: respiration and digestion and energy output, including exercise. Your body converts these excess calories to fat and stores it in your fat cells for later, just in case there's a shortage.

When that shortage doesn't come, and when you continue to exceed your calorie needs, more and more fat is stored in your fat cells, which begin to grow larger and larger. This is the reason your pants seem to get smaller and smaller.

But when you start to lose weight, the opposite happens.

"Dieting produces a condition of negative energy balance, where energy in is less than energy expended. The body must then use stored energy to survive, which primarily comes from our fat cells," Joseph Houmard, PhD, director of the human performance laboratory and professor of kinesiology at East Carolina University, tells LIVESTRONG.com. "With this 'stress' of negative energy balance, hormones in the bloodstream magnify the ability of the fat cells to release stored fat to be used for energy in other tissues."

As this happens, your fat cells shrink and your pants seem to get bigger and bigger.

This doesn't happen immediately, though. According to authors of a research review published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics in March 2014, during the early stage of weight loss the body is primarily burning stored carbohydrates and protein as well as a considerable amount of water.

This early phase lasts several days or weeks, until the body shifts to burning fat for energy. You can expect your fat cells to start whittling away by the time you reach the 10-pound mark, though, which means you'll start noticing changes in the mirror.

A drop in blood pressure is one of the positive things that happen when you lose 10 pounds.

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Beyond being able to wear skinny jeans, one of the most important reasons to lose 10 pounds or more is heart health.

Being overweight increases the volume of blood your body must circulate through your blood vessels, which increases strain on the arteries, according to the Mayo Clinic. Over time, high blood pressure can lead to a narrowing and hardening of the arteries, affecting their ability to carry fresh, oxygenated blood to the heart. This increases the risk of heart attack, stroke and heart disease.

The good news is that your blood volume decreases quite quickly when you start to lose weight. "The efficiency of weight loss is quite remarkable, with as little as 2 pounds of weight loss producing a one point drop in blood pressure," Dr. Houmard says. "Thus, relatively modest amounts of weight loss in the range of 4 to 8 pounds can decrease blood pressure by 3 to 8 points, which is significant in terms of reducing risk for heart disease and other conditions."

Just how weight loss reduces blood pressure is complex. According to Dr. Houmard, it has to do with a combination of changing hormones, better kidney function and a decreased strain on the heart.

Other mechanisms behind decreasing blood pressure and blood volume involve terms like "natriuretic peptides" and "renin-angiotensin-aldosterone." But by now you get the basic idea without going into full-on geek mode.

Hormones are your body's Uber. They carry chemical messages through your bloodstream and tissues that affect things like your metabolism, growth and development, reproduction, sexual function and mood. But excess body fat can affect the normal functioning of hormones, according to Harvard Health Publishing, and the processes they affect that are crucial to health.

A wealth of research, including a study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology in July 2012, has shown that being overweight or obese can increase a woman's risk of hormone-receptive breast cancer. According to BreastCancer.org, the association isn't fully understood, but it's likely due to increases in hormones, including estrogen, that occur with excess weight.

"Estrogenically active fat is linked with breast cancer. If the fat a woman lost was fat that produced estrogen, then hormonal levels will decrease when that fat is lost. This is why weight loss is recommended to reduce the risk of breast cancer," explains Denise Pickett-Bernard PhD, RDN, LDN, a certified practitioner with the Institute for Functional Medicine.

Losing weight can help normalize hormone levels pretty quickly. In the 2012 Journal of Clinical Oncology study, the women lost 10 percent of their body weight, on average, during the 12-month trial, and markers of several estrogen-like hormones, as well as testosterone, decreased by between 10 and 26 percent.

Interestingly enough, whether the women lost the weight via diet only or by a combination of diet and exercise affected the results. Women who both dieted and engaged in regular exercise had much greater decreases in the potentially risky hormones.

It's not all good news, however. While potentially dangerous levels of some hormones change favorably, other unfavorable hormonal changes may take place, and these can affect your ability to lose 10 pounds and then keep the weight off. "Humans are hardwired to store body fat in case of a famine," says Pickett-Bernard. As explained in a research review published in the International Journal of Obesity in August 2015, our bodies tends to adjust to a calorie deficit in an effort to maintain homeostasis and hold onto fat stores.

To maintain status quo, levels of the appetite-stimulating hormone ghrelin increase, while levels of appetite-suppressing leptin decrease. These hormonal changes can persist even after you've reached your goal, making it difficult to sustain your weight loss.

When you lose 10 pounds via exercise, your muscles and calorie burn will change along with your weight.

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If you lose 10 pounds with the help of exercise, your body will adapt, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At the beginning of a new workout regimen, you're more likely to see fast results in muscle gain and fat loss. Your body is less conditioned, so you have to work harder, and you'll burn more calories than someone who is more conditioned doing the same activity.

The good news is you're getting fitter; the bad news is that you'll have to gradually progress the intensity, duration and/or frequency of your workouts to continue to achieve results.

Being overweight increases your chances of having a sleep disorder, and having a sleep disorder increases your chances of being overweight, say the authors of a March 2013 review in Nature of Science and Sleep. Talk about a double-whammy.

The good news is that losing 10 pounds can improve your sleep along with your risk factors for obesity. In a 2012 study by researchers at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, 77 volunteers who were either overweight or obese and who reported a variety of sleep disorders were divided into two intervention groups a weight-loss diet or a weight-loss diet plus exercise.

After six months, both groups had lost 15 pounds and 15 percent of their belly fat. As a result, both groups improved their overall sleep score by approximately 20 percent. Based on those findings, losing even 10 pounds is likely to help you sleep a lot more soundly.

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What Really Happens to Your Body When You Lose 10 Pounds - LIVESTRONG.COM

From Bicycling

It should go without saying that no cyclist needs to lose weight, and cyclists indeed come in all shapes and sizes. But the reality is that many people get into cycling to lose weight, which is a challenging process, and those who are successful face an even harder road ahead: keeping the pounds off.

While theres no single strategy that works best for everyone, new research highlights certain tactics that many weight loss maintainers have in common, providing at least a roadmap for the maintenance journey.

Published in the journal Obesity, the study surveyed almost 5,000 members of WWformerly known as Weight Watcherswho lost an average of 50 pounds and didnt regain the weight for at least three years. Researchers looked at 54 behaviors related to weight management, encompassing strategies related to goal-setting, attitudes, food tracking, and type of food consumed.

In terms of habits around food, the most prevalent behaviors of the weight loss maintainers were keeping healthy, lower-calorie food accessible, setting daily consumption goals, recording actual food consumed, and continuing to measure or weigh foods.

Also important for those who kept the weight off for years is an emphasis on outlook. These participants focus on remaining positive and often think about past successes, said lead study author Suzanne Phelan, Ph.D., a kinesiology and public health professor at California Polytechnic State University.

Focus on building these skills first, she told Runners World. The more these skills are practiced, the more they become habitual.

And while there are often unhealthy temptations and distractions all around us, putting consistent habits in place can counteract this environment, Phelan added.

[Want to fly up hills? Climb! gives you the workouts and mental strategies to conquer your nearest peak.]

What the weight loss maintainers did not do was beat themselves up for regaining a few pounds or feel negative about themselves or the behaviors that had led to being overweight or obese.

Practicing self-kindness and mindfulness are connected to being self-aware, and to understanding that eating and activity are part of a process, Phelan said. There will be days of excess eating and low activity. How people respond to these days makes a difference.

Preventing weight regain isnt important just for a sense of emotional wellbeing. Recent studies have highlighted the health hazards of yo-yo dieting, since the weight thats regained is often fat, which raises heart disease risk and increases systemic inflammationa potential cause for many health issues, such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol.

For those who are on a weight loss track right now, it may be helpful to look past that goal weight moment and think about implementing strategies that will boost maintenance efforts, too. Above all, obsessing over every single calorie or every single pound can quickly result in an unhealthy mindset so focusing on awareness, positivity, and healthy habits is key.

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Yep, Its TrueStaying Positive Can Actually Help You Maintain Weight Loss - Yahoo Lifestyle

Glenn Gardner knew something was wrong last spring.

Routine things had become difficult for the longtime Fairhaven junior varsity softball coach.

Normally, Id hit the ball into the outfield with no problem, he said. But I would crank it and it would barely go into the outfield. I knew something was up. I didnt know what it was. I thought it was old age. I thought I was becoming an old man.

Rapid weight loss 26 pounds of muscle and severe muscle spasms prompted Gardner to go to the doctors to get checked out.

I did the blood tests and all that, and they said everything was fine, said the 64-year-old Fairhaven resident. Still, I knew something was wrong.

So Gardner went back for more testing and his second electromyography (EMG) this time at Mass General and in mid January, he got the dreaded diagnosis: he had ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis).

Also known as Lou Gehrigs disease, it causes the death of neurons controlling voluntary muscles. While a person keeps their cognitive functions, their body deteriorates to the point they can no longer move. There is no cure and medication is expensive and often experimental.

Its tough because coaching now I cant project my voice, said Gardner just minutes after coaching the JV teams final game of the season, a 30-26 win over Bourne on Friday. I have the kids and my assistant yelling for me. I cant do what I used to do easily. I cant breath. Your diaphragm is a muscle so I'm going to lose my voice. Right now I cant breath. I have to sleep on my side. Whenever I eat, I feel full because your lungs push up to your stomach.

Still, Gardner continues to coach.

Hell push himself through it, said Old Rochester senior Jill Higgins. You can tell it's harder for him. When he needs to be out here coaching us or rebounding balls for us, hell push himself. That's the kind of person he is.

With each day Gardner has grown weaker and weaker, but he wanted to finish out the year at Old Rochester.

There was no talking him out of it, said Old Rochester head coach Bob Hohne. He wanted to finish it.

I wouldnt have expected anything different from him," ORR athletic director Bill Tilden added. "It wasnt even a thought that crossed through his mind to not finish. Hes always been a guy that finishes something that he starts. I dont think he thought of ever taking a break from this to deal with it and I dont think theres much you can do. You just have to face it and deal with it and thats what hed want the kids to see him do too.

Gardner chose to keep his diagnosis under wraps until just recently, when his symptoms began to worsen.

We have so much respect for him, said Old Rochester senior Mary Butler, who works on her post moves with Gardner, a varsity assistant. I think one of the reasons he didnt tell anyone at first is because he didnt want to be thought of differently because hes so strong and I dont think he ever wanted us to think otherwise. Hes so respected by all of us and he means so much to all of us.

I think about how much hes been through and how much he has still contributed. He hasnt stopped contributing to our program. It shows how strong and tough of a person he is.

Higgins knows firsthand the impact ALS can have on someone as her grandmother, Elizabeth Ferria, battled the disease.

I was younger, but I understand how it goes, she said of watching her grandmother. Its not easy. Its hard for the person because their mind will stay sane throughout all of it, but sometimes you cant move and you cant talk. You know what you want to say, but it wont come out. Its terrible.

We just wanted to show him that we support him and his wife throughout everything.

When news broke of Gardners condition, the girls basketball program quickly began fundraising efforts. At both home games this week, they held a bake sale and also sold bracelets they created that said: #gardnerstrong and BOX OUT ALS.

We wanted to make sure that he felt he was loved by us and that we were here for him, said Higgins, who played two years under Gardner on JV. Hes a really good coach and a really good guy in general. Its really sad that he got this disease.

Gardner has also received an outpouring of support from his hometown of Fairhaven, where he was a former teacher at Hastings Middle School. A comedy night fundraiser, which features Frank O'Donnell as the headliner, is slated for March 13 at the Century House in Acushnet. Tickets to the fundraiser cost $50 and include food. The show will start at 6:30 p.m., and comedians will go on stage at 8:45 p.m.

When youve been around a long time, you make a lot of connections, said Gardner, who coached three sports at Fairhaven High over two decades. I get to see kids from both schools and theyve all been great.

He means a lot to a lot of people," Tilden noted.

Gardner was Fairhavens varsity field hockey coach for more than a decade, while also coaching the girls varsity basketball team for seven or eight years. He was the varsity softball coach before Cathy Silva took over the program and he moved down to the junior varsity level. He also has maintained the grounds for various Fairhaven sports for several years.

"Glenn has been with me for 17 years and has been a staple in my program," Silva said. "He is an incredible guy who has given so much of himself to the sport and to all the athletes who have come through the program. He has impacted me as both a coach and a friend."

Gardner has had a big influence on Old Rochester basketball for the past seven or eight years as the JV coach and varsity assistant.

Glenn is simply the last in a long line of great assistant coaches Ive had over the 43 years, Hohne said. The game films, the scouting, his knowledge of fundamentals when the kids come to me, they know the game of basketball.

Gardners impact goes beyond the fundamentals of basketball.

Hes kind of the bridge between coach and the kids, said Kate Butler, Marys mother. He leads the JV team, but he also works with the varsity girls. Hes the one that pulls them aside and can coach them up during the game and help them work on things in practice that coach doesnt have time because hes doing the big picture stuff.

Hes just an amazing person. Hes got a way with the kids. Hes calm and hes patient and hes caring and passionate about the game. He means a lot to the program.

Gardner has been able to relate to the players through his sense of humor.

"He's always joking around," Butler said.

When I swung (between levels) freshmen year, he always kept my mind off of it, Higgins said. He would make me laugh when I was nervous.

Gardners personality and approach has made him a favorite among many players.

He sets standards for you and he has goals he wants you to meet, but you always have fun doing it, Mary Butler said. He always makes it enjoyable.

Gardner found a creative way to motivate Meg Hughes in a matchup against 2018-19 Standard-Times Player of the Year Jayda Fortin.

I held Jayda Fortin to under six points so he bought me Riccardis pizza, Hughes recalled with a smile on her face. It was the greatest thing.

Hughes is hoping to make this a memorable curtain call for Gardner.

He wants to finish it out, she said. He wants to go to the Garden with us because thats where were going. Were doing this for him.

Follow Laurie Los Lee on Twitter @LaurieLosSCT.

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He means a lot to a lot of people Longtime coach Glenn Gardner fighting tough battle with ALS - SouthCoastToday.com

WAREHAM He may not score as smoothly as Destine Haywood-Gomes. He may not have state championship game pedigree like Joey Silvia. He may not dominate the paint like Dom Labelle or tower over every opponent like Josh Vargas. He doesn't have the small-space explosiveness of Darien Gibson or the deadly shooting of Kaemon Thomas.

But there may not be a more important Viking this season than Bryce Fernandes.

Every night, he bodies up the opposing teams best player. He grabs rebounds. He gets his hands in passing lanes. He scores on putbacks and in transition. Hes rarely out of position and hes never one to hang his head when things arent going well.

Simply put, hes the heart and soul of the Vikings, who enter the final week of the regular season riding a six-game winning streak and having already locked up a South Coast Conference Small Division championship.

Hes very important to us and what we do, Wareham coach Steve Faniel said after an 84-66 home win over GNB Voc-Tech. Bryce has been guarding the opposing teams best player since he was 10 years old. Every game hes ever played, he guarded the other teams best player. When you have a weapon like that who can neutralize a dominant scorer, that gives you a chance to win every night.

We rarely get blown out (the Vikings losses have been by 3, 7, 10 and 13 points). Even if we dont come out on top, its a close game. Thats because of the energy he brings, the leadership he brings, the communication he brings to us.

On Friday, Fernandes scored 12 points with six boards, good for the teams third-highest point total and second-highest rebounding total. But its never been the stats that differentiate Fernandes.

Theres not a lot of people like him, said fellow senior Joey Silvia, who scored a game-high 23 points. Bryce is a great basketball player. He does a lot for this team. Hes a great leader for us. It doesnt matter how much he scores, he plays defends, he gets boards, he does all the dirty work for us. Hes great to have on the team.

Beyond his status as the teams best one-on-one defender, Fernandes leadership may be his most necessary attribute on this years Wareham team, which features an embarrassment of scoring, shooting, athleticism and size up and down the roster.

I feel like I have a leadership role on this team, he said. I do all the nitty-gritty stuff. I let them get their points, but I try to work the hardest and do what I need to do to keep the team together and moving forward.

Theres only one column in the scorebook Fernandes worries about. The win column.

Thats why hes a captain and hes our only captain, Faniel said. Hes always been a weight room kid. He puts in the work in the offseason. He brings us together and does all the little things. Hes the glue guy who holds us together.

HOW IT HAPPENED

GNB Voc-Tech came out firing from deep, likely in an attempt to make up for a lack of size against Warehams imposing frontcourt. The Bears shot well enough in the first quarter to stay in the game, starting the game 4-for-10 from deep to finish the first quarter down 22-15.

Wareham, meanwhile, spent much of the first half taking advantage of the Bears lack of shot blockers. The Vikings were consistently able to get to the rim, making 10-of-11 two-point attempts in the first half. When they werent converting layups, they were drawing fouls, shooting 16 free throws in the first half (and hitting 11 of them).

They were playing good defense, Silvia said. Theyre athletic. We were just trying to take it to the rack and run on them.

The Bears hung around in the second quarter despite going 0-for-7 from 3-point land, and Wareham took a 44-32 lead into halftime. The Vikings quickly extended their lead in the third quarter. A Haywood-Gomes steal and dunk and a Silvia free throw with 5:51 left in the third pushed the advantage to 20, but the Bears had one last run in them.

Colin Wildrick got hot from deep, hitting four 3-pointers in a four-minute stretch, and suddenly Voc-Tech entered the games final eight minutes only down 10.

But a quick 6-0 spurt early in the fourth quarter, capped by a putback from Fernandes, extended the lead to 16 and the Vikings never looked back.

We wanted to keep attacking them and keep our energy up, Fernandes said. Our energy went down when they went on their run, so I tried to keep everyones energy up and we started to come together in the fourth quarter.

WHAT IT MEANS: Wareham improves to 16-4 and finishes 10-3 in the South Coast Conference. Voc-Tech falls to 6-13 and finishes 3-10 in the SCC. The Bears wrap up their season by hosting Middleboro on Tuesday. The Vikings compete in the Kuliga Classic, facing Marthas Vineyard at 4 p.m. on Monday at Apponequet.

GETTING HOT AT THE RIGHT TIME: On Jan. 17, Fairhaven beat the Vikings on Wareham's home court. It was the Vikings' third loss in a row and second-straight loss in the conference. They bounced back to win three in a row before another home loss, this time to Apponequet, which was sitting in the bottom half of the division standings. I think those losses helped us because we came together as a team, Silvia said. We knew we should have won those games, but we didnt play hard enough. It made us work harder in practice. Were playing a lot better now. Following the Apponequet loss, the Vikings managed a one-point win over Seekonk and a two-point win over Boston English, kicking off a six-game winning streak which has included a 37-point win over Case, a 19-point win over SCC Large champion Dighton-Rehoboth, an 11-point win over Fairhaven and Friday's 18-point win over Voc-Tech. It's fair to say the Vikings, who have won nine of their last 10 games, are playing their best ball of the season at the right time. This past week weve been able to get more shots and cut down on the open 3-pointers weve given up, Faniel said. I think our rotations have been a little bit better. The kids are buying in on defense and communicating with each other. They understand now that we have to share the ball and get stops. Our talent doesn't necessarily going to win all the time. If we keep playing as a team offensively and defensively its a fun way to play.

SENIOR SALUTE: Friday was the last regular-season home game for the Vikings, who honored their six seniors, five of whom Silvia, Haywood-Gomes, Fernandes, Labelle and Vargas combined for 66 points on a night the team equaled its second-highest point total of the season. We really wanted to get this one, Fernandes said. Its a big win at the end of the day. We had to win this one to keep our momentum going and defend our home court, which is something weve had trouble doing. This was a big win. Faniel added: These guys were in eighth grade when I started, so its kind of a special class to me. When I first started I saw these eighth graders and thought that when they were older wed be pretty good. I think that came to fruition. These guys have given a lot to the program. A lot of them have been with us for three or four years. Theyve been dreaming about this. Wareham has always had a great basketball tradition and I think these kids came to see Senior Night when they were in third or fourth grade and they picture what its going to be like. I hope it went well for them. I think it did. They all played pretty well and went out with a bang.

WAREHAM STATS: Haywood-Gomes finished with 17 points, four 3-pointers and five rebounds. Labelle added nine points and a team-high seven rebounds. Jett Gorman chipped in six points and four boards and Kaemon Thomas nabbed three steals. The Vikings shot 52.7% from the floor (29-for-55), 31.8% from deep (7-for-22) and 62.9% from the line (17-for-27) while turning the ball over 20 times, eight of which came in the fourth quarter.

GNB VOC-TECH STATS: Wildrick scored a team-high 17 points. Brennen Rosa had 15 points and eight rebounds, while Poitras was quiet with five points but filled up the stat sheet with eight boards and a game-high five steals. Connor Dreher added five rebounds. The Bears shot 35.4% from the field (23-for-65), 26.3% from deep (10-for-38) and 77.7% from the line (14-for-18) while turning the ball over 18 times.

NOTES: Warehams highest point total in a game this season was 86, which it scored against Somerset Berkley on Jan. 21. It also scored 84 in a win over Case on Feb. 4. Both teams played a surprising amount of zone. GNB Voc-Techs first substitution of the game featured five players, and with their first 10 shots being 3-pointers, this reporter thought they might be trying out the Grinnell system. Soon the Bears went cold from deep, missing nine-straight 3-pointers between the first and second quarters.

Follow Brendan Kurie on Twitter @BrendanKurieSCT

Wareham

Joey Silvia 23 (2), Destine Haywood-Gomes 17 (4), Bryce Fernandes 12, Dom Labelle 9, Darien Gibson 7, Jett Gorman 6, Kaemon Thomas 5 (1), Josh Vargas 5

GNB Voc-Tech

Colin Wildrick 17 (5), Brennen Rosa 15, Alex Polanco 10 (2), Payton Leandre 7 (1), Ethan Almeida 6 (2), Shane Poitras Jr. 5, Connor Dreher 4, Mason Gomes 1, Elijah Rodriguez 1

GNB Voc-Tech;15;17;23;1166

Wareham;22;22;21;1984

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Bryce Fernandes is the heart and soul of the red-hot Wareham Vikings - SouthCoastToday.com

Between its east and west ice sheets and its peninsula, Antarctica holds enough ice to raise global sea levels by around 60m.

The West Antarctic ice sheet (WAIS) is a relatively small part, containing an amount of ice equivalent to 3.3m of sea level rise. Yet, most of it sits in a precarious position and is considered theoretically unstable.

As a result, how the WAIS will change in response to human-caused warming is generally thought to be the largest source of uncertainty for long-term sea level projections.

Tipping points

The most pressing aspect of this uncertainty is understanding whether instability thresholds of ice have been crossed, whether the retreat we are now measuring is destined to continue, and whether ice that appears unchanging today will remain that way in the future.

The latest research says that the threshold for irreversible loss of the WAIS likely lies between 1.5C and 2C of global average warming above pre-industrial levels. With warming already at around 1.1C and the Paris Agreement aiming to limit warming to 1.5C or well-below 2C, the margins for avoiding this threshold are fine indeed.

According to the recent special report on the ocean and cryosphere (SROCC) by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), there are two main controls on how much global sea levels will rise this century: future human-caused greenhouse gas emissions and how warming affects the Antarctic ice sheet. The IPCC says:

Beyond 2050, uncertainty in climate change induced SLR [sea level rise] increases substantially due to uncertainties in emission scenarios and the associated climate changes, and the response of the Antarctic ice sheet in a warmer world.

The concern around the vulnerability of the WAIS principally lies in something called marine ice sheet instability (MISI) marine because the base of the ice sheet is below sea level and instability for the fact that, once it starts, the retreat is self-sustaining.

Ice sheets can be thought of as huge freshwater reservoirs. Snow accumulates in the cold interior, slowly compacts to become glacier ice and then begins to flow like a very thick fluid back toward the ocean.

In some places, the ice reaches the coast and floats on the ocean surface, forming an ice shelf. The boundary between ice resting on the land surface (or the sea floor in the case of a marine ice sheet) is called the grounding line. The grounding line is where water stored in the ice sheet returns to the ocean. And when it moves seaward, we say the ice sheet has a positive mass balance that is to say, it is gaining more ice mass than it is losing back to the sea.

But when the grounding line retreats, the balance is negative. A negative ice sheet balance means a positive contribution to the ocean and, thus, to global sea level.

This basic picture of ice sheet mass balance is all you need to understand why glaciologists are concerned about MISI.

Changes to the ice shelf on the floating side of the grounding line such as thinning can cause ice on the grounded side to lift off from the seafloor. As this ice floats, the grounding line will retreat. Because the ice flows more rapidly when it is floating than it does when grounded, the rate of ice flow near the grounding line will increase. Stretching caused by the faster flow becomes a new source of thinning near the grounding line.

This is illustrated in the figure below. As the newly floating ice flows and thins more quickly, it can cause more ice to lift off and float, driving the grounding line back.

In addition, the areas of the ice sheet at risk of MISI have a reverse, or retrograde gradient, which means it gets deeper further inland. As the grounding line retreats further into thicker parts of the ice sheet, the flow speeds up, further increasing ice loss. The reverse gradient makes this process self-sustaining as a positive feedback loop this is what makes MISI an instability.

It is not clear yet if the MISI threshold has been crossed anywhere in Antarctica. We do know that grounding lines are retreating along the Amundsen Sea coastline most spectacularly on the Thwaites Glacier. And the driver for the retreat appears to be relatively warm ocean water about 2C warmer than the historical average flowing toward the grounding line and causing stronger than usual melting.

Graphic: Carbon Brief. Credit: Quantarctica/Norwegian Polar Institute.

If the instability has not started and if the ocean warming stops, then the grounding line should find a new balancing point at a new location. But if it has started, then the retreat will continue no matter what happens next.

Even if the threshold has been crossed or even if it is crossed in the future the retreat can proceed at different rates depending on how hard we were pushing when it started.

Heres how that works. The instability depends on a balance of forces within the ice sheet. A force due to gravity causes the ice to flow at a speed that depends in part on its thickness and its surface slope.

A larger melt rate on the floating side and faster flow across the grounding line will draw down the surface of the ice more quickly than smaller rates will. The faster draw-down generates a steeper surface slope and, thus, faster flow and faster retreat.

A modelling study of this feedback, published last year, found that when MISI started with a larger push (a larger melt rate), it proceeded more quickly than when it started with a smaller push, even after the extra melting was removed.

This means that even if MISI is invoked, cutting global emissions and slowing warming will give more time to get ready for its consequences.

There appears to be a second source of instability for marine ice sheets one that comes into play if the ice shelves are lost entirely.

Some of the most spectacular images of glacier change are of iceberg calving in other words, breaking off from the heavily crevassed fronts of marine-terminating glaciers.

This calving is caused by melting of the underside of the ice shelf, as well as hydro-fracturing where meltwater forming on the surface of the ice shelf seeps into the ice and causes cracking or a combination of the two.

How quickly calving happens depends on the height of the ice cliff face above the waterline the higher the cliff stands above the water, the larger the calving rate.

As is the case for MISI, the declining gradient of seafloor beneath the WAIS means that as the ice cliff retreats into thicker ice it will continue to expose an ever-higher cliff to the ocean and the calving rate must increase.

This process, illustrated below, is called marine ice cliff instability (MICI). The theory suggests that where the height of a glacier face exceeds around 100m above the ocean surface, the cliff will be too tall to support its own weight. It will, therefore, inevitably collapse, exposing a similarly tall cliff face behind it, which, too, will collapse. And so on.

The IPCCs SROCC says that Thwaites Glacier is particularly important because it extends into the interior of the WAIS, where the bed is >2000m below sea level in places. (Although, the SROCC also notes that while MISI requires a retrograde bed slope to occur, MICI could even happen on a flat or seaward-inclined bed.)

This recently identified process is not as well studied as MISI, but this is sure to change in the years ahead, as scientists continue to observe fast-changing systems such as the Thwaites Glacier.

A Nature study in 2016 on MICI concluded that Antarctica has the potential to contribute more than a metre of sea level rise by 2100 and more than 15metres by 2500. More recent research concluded this is likely to be an overestimate, but noted it is not yet clear what role MICI could play this century. Another study has also suggested that rapid loss of ice through MICI may be mitigated by a slower loss of the ice shelves that hold the glaciers back.

Late last year, a large team of modellers assessed different studies of ice sheet response to the Paris climate target to keep global average warming well below 2C.

The models all point in the same direction. Namely, that the threshold for irreversible ice loss in both the Greenland ice sheet and the WAIS is somewhere between 1.5C and 2C global average warming. And we are already at a bit more than 1C warming right now.

This 1.5-2C window is key for the survival of Antarctic ice shelves, the review paper explained, and thus their buttressing effect on the glaciers they hold back.

Glossary

Another threshold may lie between 2C and 2.7C, the authors added. Reaching this level of global temperature rise could trigger the activation of several larger systems, such as the Ross and Ronne-Filchner drainage basins, and onset of much larger SLR contributions.

The Ross and Ronne-Filchner are the two largest ice shelves in Antarctica. These could be substantially reduced within 100300 years, another study says, in scenarios where global emissions exceed the RCP2.6 scenario. This emissions pathway is generally considered to be consistent with limiting warming to 2C.

These findings imply that preventing substantial Antarctic ice loss relies on limiting global emissions to or below RCP2.6. As the paper concludes: Crossing these thresholds implies commitment to large ice-sheet changes and SLR that may take thousands of years to be fully realised and be irreversible on longer timescales.

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Guest post: How close is the West Antarctic ice sheet to a 'tipping point'? - Carbon Brief