Scientists have discovered an ancient lake under the ice of Greenland

Using radar and other ice-infiltration devices, scientists have discovered a “fossil lake” preserved under a sheet of Greenland ice, which is the first discovery of its kind.

According to Columbia University, now a basin, smoking from a large sheet of ice, the former lake once measured 2,740 square miles (7,100 square kilometers), a joint area with Rhode Island and Delaware, according to Columbia University. Press announcement. In some places it sank to a depth of 2030 feet (4 meters0 meters) and was fed by more than a dozen streams. It doesn’t sound like much of a Greenland-ish today, but the island probably looked millions of years ago.

After all, though – and we’re never sure when this lake is frozen in ice, never to see the light again. New Research Published in Earth and Planetary Science Letters shows that the lake is now buried 1.1 miles (1.8 kilometers) below the ice. At one time the water passing through this ancient basin probably lasted a long time, removed by a sheet of invading ice, but the silt of the lake is in its place.

Scientists have previously discovered ancillary lakes in both Greenland And Antarctica. The difference here is that the newly discovered fossil lake does not have liquid water and is located on the rocky surface of Greenland. According to the press release, no such thing has been found before.

The data used for the search were collected by NASA’s Operation Icebridge, which included low itude altitude. Greenland ice sheet survey Use of ice-penetrating radar and devices capable of measuring gravity and magnetic anomalies. Radar allowed scientists to build A topographic map of the Earth’s surface beneath a sheet of ice, revealing a basin. Gravity measurements show that there is less ganse than the material in the basin Found from the surrounding rock, which is hard and metaphorical. And because silt is less magnetic than solid rock, the researchers were able to map the depth of silt trapped in the basin.

T.He disclosed the informationEd K. Ancient lake, Located in northwestern Greenland, once featured ths depths of water between 164 and 820 feet (50 to 250 meters). The level of silt was found to be 0.75 miles (1.2 kilometers)) Thick, That infill significant depth Probably stored over hundreds of thousands of years –And maybe millions of years-Before the Ice Age of Greenland. Topographic features allowed the team to identify at least 18 former flow beds that once entered the lake on its northern shore. Potential outlet flow was also looked south.

In a press release, Guy Paxman, a postdoctoral researcher at Columbia University’s Lemont-Doherty Earth Observatory, who led the study, He said his team is still unable to date the lake, but if “we can get to that silt, they will be able to tell us when the ice was present or absent.” Indeed, these scientists, and perhaps others, would love to get their hands on this ancient silt, which they would do by drilling through a sheet of ice.

In Sediment samples in addition to dating the lake and showing when the ice was and was not present Signs of ancient life can be found in the form of plant spores or other organic matter. If discovered, this biosignature will promote theories about Greenland’s climate history, and how it depicts vast forests at one time. As the authors write, “the subglacial landscape in Greenland is pre-dated to extensive glaciers,” and as a result, “the basin may contain important records of the history of regional snowfall and the Palacioclimate.”

That said, it will be difficult to prove some of this, as the surface material has been transported far and wide by the flow and flow of glaciers.

Drilling in ice so far is not without precedent. Back in the 1990s, researchers Stretched 2-miles long (3.2-kilometers long) The ice core, from the Greenland ice sheet, has a history of 110,000 years. Scientists have done the same similar Success Drilling cores in Antarctica ice. And now, thanks to this new discovery, we have a new destination in northwest Greenland. Let’s do the drilling!

Oh, I’ll mention the amazing burial that I’m burying Soak the effect Found in Greenland two years ago. Also found by ground-pressing radar, the pit measures about 19 miles (30 kilometers).S.), Making it one of the largest planet craters on Earth. Some cool things are hiding under the huge snow sheets – we just have to watch.