Scientists report Lake Vostok breakthrough

Scientists drilling into Lake Vostok claim to have found water beneath the Antarctic ice.


More than 300 such sub-glacial lakes are known to exist in the White Continent but it is the first time one has actually been discovered.

"This fills my soul with joy," says Valery Lukin, from Russia's Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute (AARI) in St Petersburg.

"This will give us the possibility to biologically evaluate the evolution of living organisms... because those organisms spent a long time without contact with the atmosphere, without sunlight."

The lake is located in one of the lowest-temperature areas of the world which is known to have reached -89C on 21 July 1983.


Source: BBC News