Patterned ground is a relatively new term, introduced by A. L. Washburn in 1950, to describe “more or less symmetrical forms, such as circles, polygons, nets, steps, and stripes, that are characteristic of, but not necessarily confined to, mantle subject to intensive frost action.” They correspond to microrelief forms of the earth surface and to structures also known as “structure ground” or “soil structures.”
All these forms chiefly occur in polar or subpolar regions, in the arctic desert and tundra zones in particular. Patterned ground forms are, therefore, characteristic of microrelief of periglacial zone (see air photographs, e.g., in Thornbury, 1954). They are common in Alaska, in northern Canada, Canadian Arctic Archipelago ; they surround the inland ice-sheet of Greenland and are also found in Spitsbergen, in the tundras of northern Europe, in islands of the Soviet Arctic and in Siberia. In the southern hemisphere patterned ground occurs in the rocky surfaces of Antarctica and...
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References
Embleton, C. and King, C. A. M., 1968, Glacial and Periglacial Geomorphology, London, E. Arnold Ltd., 608pp.
Högbom, B., 1914, Über die geologische Bedeutung des Frostes, Upsala Univ. Geol. Inst. Bull., 12, 257–389.
Leffingwell, E. de K., 1919, The Canning River Region, Northern Alaska, U.S. Geol. Surv. Profess. Paper 109, 251pp.
Troll, C., 1944, Strukturböden, Solifluktion und Frost-Klimate der Erde, Geol. Rundschau, 34, 545–694.
Washburn, A. L., 1956, Classification of patterned ground and review of suggested origins, Geol. Soc. Am. Bull., 67, 823–866.
Thornbury, W. D., 1954, Principles of Geomorphology, New York, John Wiley & Sons, 618pp.
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Jahn, A. (1968). Patterned ground . In: Geomorphology. Encyclopedia of Earth Science. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-31060-6_273
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