Robots explore underground lakes
If people can’t get into the deep cracks and crevasses in the ice, then why not drop a robot down there?
That’s exactly what British scientists are doing. Deep beneath the ice is a lake that could contain life; the aim of the project is to study the microbes, other life-forms and the lake sediments to find out exactly what’s down there.
Twelve universities are going to be involved in the project to study Lake Ellsworth, in the West Antarctic. It might sound easy, but when the lake is some two miles below ground, it becomes rather more difficult, hence the need for non-human field-workers. The robot probes will be dropped into the lake and report back with no danger on the surface.
It’s hoped that the findings will also tell us whether the West Antarctic region was in fact always ice covered, or whether it became ice free when the last ice sheet melted. Some 145 sub-glacial lakes lie under the Antarctic ice, where heat from the Earth’s core has melted the ice away leaving water-filled caverns.
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