Lake Whillans
| Whillans Lake | ||
|---|---|---|
| Geographical location | Siple Coast , Marie Byrd Land (politically: Ross Dependency ), West Antarctica | |
| Data | ||
| Coordinates | 84 ° 15 ′ 0 ″ S , 153 ° 30 ′ 0 ″ W | |
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| surface | 60 km² | |
| Middle deep | 2 m | |
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particularities |
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The Lake Whillans is a subglacial lake beneath the Whillans-Eisstromes , at the southeast corner of the Ross Ice Shelf . The lake is 800 meters below the ice sheet. Its temperature is −0.49 ° C. Due to the high pressure, it is still liquid. It is named after the glaciologist Ian Whillans of Ohio State University .
discovery
The lake was first described in 2007 by Helen Fricker , a glaciologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography . Satellite data indicated that there might be a lake under the ice due to the uplift and subsidence of the ice.
research
On January 28, 2013, the Whillans Ice Stream Subglacial Access Research Drilling (WISSARD) team reported that they had reached the surface of the lake by drilling through the 800 m thick ice. The drilling was carried out with a so-called hot water drill , 30 cm in diameter, the water of which was disinfected using UV radiation. In the following days, water samples and sediment deposits were collected from the bottom of the lake. Initial analyzes showed that both the water and sediment samples contained microbiological life. Bacteria survive in this environment without photosynthesis . The ecosystem appears to be based on the oxidation of ammonia and methane from sediments that are at least 120,000 years old. According to WISSARD, the project is the first successful acquisition of clean samples from a subglacial Antarctic lake . Similar attempts have already been made at Lake Vostok , so far unsuccessfully, and at Lake Ellsworth , where the wells had to be stopped.
However, Lake Whillans is not a self-contained ecosystem , as the water is completely exchanged about every three years by a subglacial river flowing through it.
The researchers hope that these projects will provide insights into possible life in our solar system. The moons Europa ( Jupiter ) and Enceladus ( Saturn ) in particular could have large amounts of liquid water beneath their ice crust.
See also
Web links
- deutschlandfunk.de Science in focus January 1, 2018, Dagmar Röhrlich : Survival under ice
- polarnews.ch February 25, 2013: Another drilling project after subglacial lake
- Welt.de August 21, 2014: Life exists deep under the ice of the Antarctic
Individual evidence
- ^ Lake drilling team discovers life under the ice . Nature. Retrieved September 2, 2014
- ^ First samples of Antarctic lake reveal thriving life . Newscientist. Retrieved September 2, 2014
- ↑ Life Found Deep Under Antarctic Ice for First Time? . Nationalgeographic. Retrieved September 2, 2014
- ^ Douglas Fox: Lakes under the ice: Antarctica's secret garden . In: Nature . tape 512 , no. 7514 , August 21, 2014, p. 244–246 , doi : 10.1038 / 512244a ( nature.com [accessed November 1, 2017]).
- ↑ Forschungszentrum Jülich on planeterde.de: Waiting for a clear view ( memento of the original from January 6, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed September 2, 2014
- ↑ Drill reaches Antarctica's under-ice Lake Whillans . BBC. Retrieved September 2, 2014
- ↑ Randy Showstack: Drilling reaches Antarctic subglacial Lake Whillans. In: Eos, Transactions American Geophysical Union. 94, 2013, pp. 63-63, doi : 10.1002 / 2013EO060004 .
