Russian researchers are preparing to crack the secrets of a lake that has lain buried beneath a 3km layer of Antarctic ice for 16 million years. They believe its lessons could be crucial in deciphering climate change, developing new medicines and understanding how life might evolve on other worlds.
But the plan to drill into the lake has alarmed scientists in other countries who say the project is rushed, its technology is untested and it could pollute Lake Vostok's waters irretrievably.
"The Russian drillershave almost reached Lake Vostok, and their borehole is brimming with about 60 tonnes of kerosene, antifreeze and bacteria. If that leaked into the lake, it would ruin it," said Cynan Ellis-Evans, a microbiologist with the British Antarctic Survey.
"I have yet to see evidence that the proposed technology has been fully field-tested," he added.
Antarctica's buried lakes were first discovered a decade ago by satellites and aircraft with powerful radar devices.
Previously it was thought the continent was too cold for water to exist in liquid form beneath its ice sheets. It is now known that this ice acts as an insulating blanket which traps heat from from the Earth's core, melting the base of the ice sheet.
"We now know there are more than 100 lakes like Lake Vostok in the Antarctic," said Martin Siegert, geography professor at Bristol University. "However, Vostok is the oldest, biggest and most important."
Research suggests the lake was formed when ice started to build up on the Antarctic mainland around 16 million years ago when the continent was affected by as yet poorly understood climate changes.
"The lake is a time capsule that goes back to the period when the continent started to freeze over," Ellis-Evans said.
"The microbes that live in it could be invaluable in telling us how life survives the change from a greenhouse into an ice house," he added.
Lake Vostok also interests astronomers because its waters are thought to be similar to those on Europa, a moon of Jupiter that has an ocean covered with ice that is kilometers thick. This ocean may be teeming with life forms, say scientists, and studying Vostok may teach them how to study Europa.
The Russians were already drilling near Vostok when it was found, and by 1999 they were only 150m above its surface.
Drilling was halted during an investigation by the international Subglacial Antarctic Lake Exploration Committee, which remains fearful that drilling plans could pollute the lake.
The Russians are unmoved. Led by Valery Lukin, who directs the Russian Antarctic Expedition, they insist there is no danger. His group plans to start drilling in a few days and descend 50m in the next few weeks, drop another 50m next year, and finally take the plunge into the lake in 2007.
Lukin told the journal Science that removing some kerosene and antifreeze spilt by the drill into the borehole will reduce pressure inside, so water will rush up out of the lake instead of the pollutants dropping down.
Siegert argued, "The Russians should not be trying this out on the most important, most precious of all Antarctica's sub-glacial lakes. There are plenty of others easier to get to -- such as Lake Ellsworth in west Antarctic where a UK team will be working in a few weeks."
Ellis-Evans said, "Russian scientists want to be the first to penetrate these mysterious lakes and, not surprisingly, feel some `ownership'' of Lake Vostok. But their three-year timetable seems over-hasty, and they risk ruining the most important of all Antarctic lakes."
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