AN UNEXPLORED lake “frozen in time” for hundreds of thousands of years beneath Antarctica could contain “unique forms of life” that may even give clues to life on Mars, scientists claim.
A team, including British experts, has been given the go-ahead to explore Lake Ellsworth, which it describes as “one of the planet’s last great frontiers”.
Buried under three kilometres of ice, the lake, the size of England’s Lake Windermere, has been sealed from the outside world until now, and is likely to be home to unknown, unspoiled life-forms. The team hopes the exploration of the waters (which have been shielded from the world’s pollution by the aged ice sheet) will yield vital clues about climate change, future sea-level rise, and even the nature of life on Mars. During the 2012-13 winter season, the research team will go “deep field” into west Antarctica to sample water from the lake in search of “tiny life forms never before seen”.
