Scientists report the discovery of a thriving ecosystem of living organisms in one of Earth’s most extreme environments: beneath 14 meters of ice covering Antarctica’s frozen Lake Enigma.
A permanently frozen body of water in the Northern Foothills of Antarctica’s Victoria Land, the lake is one of the least likely locations on Earth that scientists would have expected to be home to life. Previously thought to be entirely frozen from top to bottom, now an international team of scientists have discovered an enormous body of unfrozen water hidden several meters below the lake’s icy exterior, in which a once-secret microbial ecosystem resides.
The discovery, part of the ENIGMA project funded by the National Antarctic Research Program, upends past findings about Lake Enigma, and offers unique insights into one of Earth’s most inhospitable environments.
The findings could also provide clues to researchers about the potential for microbial life’s existence within similar habitats elsewhere in our solar system, including icy moons like Saturn’s Enceladus and Jupiter’s Europa.\
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