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Frost weathering is a collective term for several mechanical weathering processes induced by stresses created by the freezing of water into ice. The term serves as an umbrella term for a variety of processes, such as frost shattering, frost wedging, and cryofracturing.
Two types of physical breakdown are freeze-thaw weathering and thermal fracturing. Pressure release can also cause weathering without temperature change. It is usually much less important than chemical weathering, but can be significant in subarctic or alpine environments. [5] Furthermore, chemical and physical weathering often go hand in hand.
The term "felsenmeer" comes from the German meaning "sea of rock". In a felsenmeer or blockfield, freeze-thaw weathering has broken up the top layer of the rock, covering the underlying rock formation with jagged, angular boulders. Freeze-thaw or frost weathering occurs when water that is trapped along microcracks in rock expands and contracts ...
In addition to chemical and physical weathering of hydraulic action, freeze-thaw cycles, and more, there is a suite of processes which have long been considered to contribute significantly to bedrock channel erosion include plucking, abrasion (due to both bedload and suspended load), solution, and cavitation.
Higher altitudes are associated with more periglacial activity due to colder temperatures, increased freeze-thaw cycles, and greater exposure to wind and snow accumulation. These conditions favor processes like frost heaving, solifluction, and ice wedge formation, which are hallmarks of periglacial environments.
Photograph taken 21 March 2010 in Norwich, Vermont. Frost heaving (or a frost heave) is an upwards swelling of soil during freezing conditions caused by an increasing presence of ice as it grows towards the surface, upwards from the depth in the soil where freezing temperatures have penetrated into the soil (the freezing front or freezing boundary).
[1] [2] As the granite expands the outer, most shells become susceptible to weathering by water pressure, freeze/thaw cycles, and functioning vegetation is a process called physical weathering. [5] The sheets of granite are large enough to shave off sharp edges on the granite's surface creating a dome shape.
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