By Sid Perkins
Lake Vostok, a vast freshwater lake locked in perpetual darkness beneath 4 kilometers of glacial ice in Antarctica, nevertheless harbors life. New measurements of the movement of the lake’s overlying ice sheet could help scientists determine where to drill to get the freshest samples of that life without contaminating the lake.
Scientists have drilled to within 120 meters of the lake’s surface and found microbes in ice samples (SN: 10/9/99, p. 230: https://www.sciencenews.org/sn_arc99/10_9_99/fob6.htm). Those organisms lived in the lake but were trapped in ice as lake water froze onto the ice sheet passing overhead, the researchers propose.