New Subglacial Lake Found In Antarctica

First Posted: Apr 29, 2016 04:18 AM EDT
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A large lake beneath the Antarctic ice was recently discovered and it seems that it may have been lying there, undisturbed, for millennia. The lake that scientists believe measure approximately 87 by 12 miles is connected to a canyon system that is about 680 miles in extent.

The findings, which are first published in Geology said that the lake was discovered upon finding faint grooves in the ice. With the help of satellite imagery, the region was found to be part of the Princess Elizabeth Land.

Martin Siegert of the Imperial College London told New Scientist that there have been strange, linear channels on the surface, and they are inferring that these are above massive, 1,000-kilometer-long channels that are part of a subglacial lake. Researchers from the US and China have flown over the region and are now gathering ice, which they hoped will confirm the presence of under-ice features.

The researchers will have a meeting in May to look over the data, so that they can begin testing their hypotheses about the lake and its channels.

Despite its size, though, the lake, once confirmed, will not be the largest discovered under the frozen ice cap of the Antarctic. Lake Vostok was measured at 160 by 30 miles, making it the sixth largest lake if set on the United States - more than twice as large as the great Salt Lake in Utah.

These subglacial lakes are a mystery to scientists - in 2012, Russians drilled into Lake Vostok to find evidence of unusual life, although their findings were met with controversy. Still, it is possible that these unlikely ecosystems found in subglacial environments are kept alive by some form of chemosynthesis which come from minerals descending from the ice above, or from the marine sediments below.

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