Scientists Stunned to Find Life Under Nearly 3,000 Feet of Antarctic Ice
Scientists have accidentally discovered life beneath a giant floating ice shelf in the Antarctic.
Researchers drilled through over 2,900 feet of ice in the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf, located on the South Eastern Weddell Sea, and found stationary animals attached to a boulder on the seafloor, according to a study in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science.
The animals were discovered in complete darkness in temperatures of 28 degrees Fahrenheit about 162 miles away from the open ocean, conditions very few animals have been observed in previously.
Sponges and potentially several unknown species were found by marine biologists who did not expect to find life “this far from a source of food or daylight.”
“This discovery is one of those fortunate accidents that pushes ideas in a different direction and shows us that Antarctic marine life is incredibly special and amazingly adapted to a frozen world,” biogeographer and the study’s lead author Dr. Huw Griffiths said, according to the British Antarctic Survey.
“Our discovery raises so many more questions than it answers, such as how did they get there? What are they eating? How long have they been there? How common are these boulders covered in life? Are these the same species as we see outside the ice shelf or are they new species? And what would happen to these communities if the ice shelf collapsed?”
Floating ice shelves cover over 579,000 square miles of the Antarctic continental shelf, but scientists have only studied the habitat through eight boreholes.
“The total area that human beings have seen under the ice shelves adds up to about the size of a tennis court,” Griffiths said.
“The area underneath these giant floating ice shelves is probably one of the least-known habitats on earth.”
In the past, scientists have theorized that life becomes less abundant as you move away from sunlight and open water.
Filter-feeding organisms, like sponges, that depend on a supply of food from above were expected to be among the first creatures to disappear.
Discovery of life after drilling through 900m of Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf in #Antarctica.
Published today @FrontMarineSci – https://t.co/atdkiv1GrA @griffiths_huw @shelfyice @hotwateronice @wavygk @GeoscienceAus @morroghmax @post_alix @nuigalway @UCR_EP_Sci @NERCscience pic.twitter.com/L8P9tt2DbZ
— British Antarctic Survey (@BAS_News) February 15, 2021
“We were expecting to retrieve a sediment core from under the ice shelf, so it came as a bit of a surprise when we hit the boulder and saw from the video footage that there were animals living on it,” BAS geologist Dr. James Smith said.
Researchers are trying to find new ways to study these organisms, noting that collapsing ice shelves and climate change mean that time is running out.
“To answer our questions we will have to find a way of getting up close with these animals and their environment — and that’s under [2,953 feet] of ice, [162 miles] away from the ships where our labs are,” Griffiths said.
“This means that as polar scientists we are going to have to find new and innovative ways to study them and answer all the new questions we have.”
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