Forgotten for 14,000,000 Years, Waiting Under the Ice

"Drill Close to Reaching 14-Million-Year-Old Antarctic Lake"
Duncan Geere, Wired UK, Wired Science (January 7, 2011)

"Lake Vostok, which has been sealed off from the world for 14 million years, is about to be penetrated by a Russian drill bit...."

Lake Vostok is about two and a half miles below the surface of Antarctica's icecap - and most likely won't come in contact with that drill bit. Several paragraphs later, the same article identifies the technology that'll be used for the last several yards as a "thermal lance."

Maybe that's nitpicking, but the Lemming prefers that articles be internally consistent, at least.

Moving along.

There's more than the depth of this subglacial lake that makes it special:

"...The lake, which lies 2.5 miles below the icy surface of Antarctica, is unique in that it's been completely isolated from the other 150 subglacial lakes on the continent for such a long time. It's also oligotropic, meaning that it's supersaturated with oxygen: Levels of the element are 50 times higher than those found in most typical freshwater lakes...."

Researchers have been trying to get at Lake Vostok for two decades. There's more of a challenge to the job, than just being in a place that's even less hospitable than Minnesota in winter.

The trick isn't just getting a probe into the lake. It's getting a clean probe into the lake. The place has been cut off from the rest of Earth's life for a remarkably long time - which makes any critters found there very, very interesting indeed.

Provided that contemporary critters don't get at them first. Hence the need for being really, really tidy about the drilling process.

Here's where the thermal lance is mentioned:

"...The drill bit currently sits less than 328 feet above the lake. Once it reaches 65 to 98 feet, the mechanical drill bit will be replaced with a thermal lance that's equipped with a camera...."

"...When the sample can be recovered, however, it's hoped that it'll shed light on extremophiles — lifeforms that survive in extreme environments. Life in Lake Vostok would need adaptions to the oxygen-rich environment, which could include high concentrations of protective enzymes. The conditions in Lake Vostok are very similar to the conditions on Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus, so the new data could also strengthen the case for extraterrestrial life...."

This wouldn't be the first time that microbes from a very old, very isolated, ecosystem on Earth have been recovered and studied. (June 15, 2009) It's still a rare opportunity to study life that has been out of the loop for a very long time.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "IceCube Neutrino Observatory: Again"
  (December 28, 2010)
• "Antarctic Ice Cap Didn't Get the Memo"
  (April 18, 2009)
• "Creepy Crawlies in Antarctica: Tundra Tales"
  (July 25, 2008)
• "Ancient Antarctic Lake: Catch-22 for Scientists"
  (December 4, 2007)

IceCube Neutrino Observatory: Again

"The World's Biggest, Iciest Particle Detector"
Dave Mosher, Wired Science (December 28, 2010)

"Construction of the world's largest particle detector is now complete after 10 years of drilling deeper than a mile into ultraclear Antarctic ice.

"Called the IceCube, the three-dimensional array of sensors can detect neutrinos expelled by some of the universe's most violent sources, including black holes, supernovas and energetic stars.

"Neutrinos weigh hardly anything, so the particles usually travel through matter — including the sun and Earth — without interacting. But every now and then they slam into the cores of atoms to create nuclear particle showers. The events emit faint blue trails of light which IceCube's 5,160 sensors can track with extreme precision...."

If the IceCube neutrino observatory sounds familiar, maybe you read the Lemmings micro-review on another article, ten days ago.

The Wired Science article is short, but has a favorable content/fluff ratio. And, pictures. Also this extra content on the article's home page:

"...Video: Animations show the drilling of IceCube's 1.5-mile-deep holes, the completed array of light-detecting sensors and a simulation of a neutrino collision event.
"Credit: NSF, IceCube/University of Madison-Wisconsin and Chris Bickel...."

Another page, "Last Sensor," displays photos of the sensors: and a closeup on the last one to be set in place. The crew autographed in.

That page also explains a little more about just how the IceCube array detects neutrinos. The sensors pick up Cherenkov radiation: "Light emitted by particles that move through a medium in which the speed of light is slower than the speed of the particles." ("Appendix A Glossary of Nuclear Terms," The Nuclear Wall Chart, The ABC's of Nuclear Science, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab)

That "through a medium in which the speed of light is slower than the speed of the particles" isn't as exotic as it sounds. Although warp ships (the Lemming will get back to that) would almost certainly generate Cherenkov radiation, neutrinos in ice are a more ordinary sort of thing.

The speed of light is, as far as physicists can tell, as fast as anything can travel through space. That's speed of light in a vacuum. Light slows down, a little, when it travels through matter. Like ice. light doesn't slow down much, but a neutrino screaming in from space is going faster than the speed light makes, going through ice. Which is, again, why IceCube works.

There's a pretty good explanation of Cherenkov radiation at a page titled, reasonably enough, "Cherenkov Radiation," at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia's website. (Department of Physics & Astronomy)

"Warp Ship?!" What, the Lemming's a Trekkie?

The Lemming enjoyed the original Star Trek series, and quite a few of the subsequent series and movies. There are even episodes that I'd be willing see again. But Scottie's warp drive, with it's not-entirely-consistent performance limits, isn't real.

What a physicist named Alcubierre came up with a few years ago is. Or, rather, might be. The power requirements are, literally, astronomical. But it looks like once we're able to generate enough power, and can use the energy to bend space, it's possible to create a semi-independent pocket of space, and move that pocket around through the rest of space at any speed.

The math is beyond what the Lemming's learned: but the last I heard, quite a few other physicists were taking the Alcubierre equations seriously. The last I heard, the 'common sense' physicists are saying that an Alcubierre warp is possible: but isn't stable. (Links in "Humanity in Space: The Next Few Centuries")

Now, Back to IceCube and Frozen Photomultipliers

Since IceCube's senors are lowered down very deep shafts melted in Antarctica's icecap, and left to freeze in place as water flows back in and turns to ice: once they're in place, they're not coming out.

The good news is that it's a comparatively low-maintenance piece of hardware. The bad news is that if something goes wrong with a sensor, there's no way to pull it out for repairs.

More good news, though: The array should be good for about 20 years of observations. And the researchers already have a little data from the parts of the array that are already online. ("Sky Map")

Related post:

• "IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica: Remote, Chilly, and a New Window on the Cosmos"
  (December 18, 2010)

IceCube Neutrino Observatory in Antarctica: Remote, Chilly, and a New Window on the Cosmos

"One of the World's Biggest Telescopes Is Buried Beneath the South Pole"
Blake Snow, Science, FoxNews.com (December 17, 2010)

"Like exploding stars, black holes, dark matter? How about cosmic intrigue, deep space astronomy, or origins of the universe?

Then you're gonna love this.

Researchers at the University of Wisconsin are putting the finishing touches on a giant underground telescope buried beneath the South Pole to help understand said phenomena. Accordingly called the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, completion is expected to occur at 8 p.m. CST, once the last of more than 5,000 optical sensors is buried as much as two miles below the permanent ice cap covering Antarctica...."

Instead of detecting photons, like telescopes we use to observe light, infrared, radio, ultraviolet, and other electromagnetic radiation, this telescope detects neutrinos.

The article's style is breezy, which in the Lemming's opinion helps make a fairly technical subject: fun to read about.

As for why bury the IceCube Neutrino Observatory? Neutrinos pass through just about everything: and are easier to detect when just about everything else is stopped by up to two miles of ice.

Related post:

• "IceCube Neutrino Observatory: Again"
  (December 28, 2010)

The Ice is Falling! Runaway Melt Mode! And You Should See What's Happening to Minnesota Trees!

"Greenland, Antarctic Ice 'in Runaway Melt Mode' "
The Associated Press, via FOXNews (Wednesday, September 23, 2009)

"New satellite information shows that ice sheets in Greenland and western Antarctica continue to shrink faster than scientists thought and in some places are already in runaway melt mode.

"British scientists for the first time calculated changes in the height of the vulnerable but massive ice sheets and found them especially worse at their edges. That is where warmer water eats away from below. In some parts of Antarctica, ice sheets have been losing 30 feet a year in thickness since 2003, according to a paper published online Thursday in the journal Nature...."

Well, that's interesting.

I'm not sure whether the Nature journal article will be published tomorrow, and this is a pre-publication piece; or if it was published six days ago.

Either way, like I said, it's interesting.

I'm not going to start crying out, 'the ice is falling, the ice is falling,' though.

It's not that I doubt the data. It's consistent with a post from April 18, 2009 about conditions in Antarctica. Ice is breaking off the 'western' part of Antarctica, like it does every 10 to 50 years - and getting thicker elsewhere.

This AP article is a pretty good read, though - and shows what sort of data we can collect these days. As for the conclusions: there's a old adage in academic circles, "publish or perish."

Academics, Show Biz, Shakespeare, and The Matrix

A professor's career depends, in large part, on how many papers he or she can publish, and how well they're received. In that respect, it's sort of like show business: you're only as good as your last review.

In one of my fields, English, I think that 'publish or perish' pressure was part of the force behind papers and articles showing how Shakespeare didn't really write Shakespeare. The underlying truth is that William Shakespeare's plays were commercial productions.

William had a financial interest in the Globe theater, and didn't mind writing material for the actors. This was before international copyright laws, so the Bard of Avon did his research, found plays written in other countries, took their characters and general outlines, and came up with commercial hack-work like Hamlet, Othello, and King Lear.

Some of Shakespeare's plays are, demonstrably, re-writes of earlier works: which would have remained in richly-deserved anonymity if Shakespeare hadn't applied his considerable linguistic and dramatic talents to reviving them.

Some of those 'Shakespeare Didn't Write Shakespeare' pieces used the sort of logic that would let you say that "The Matrix" is just a remake of Kronos. (Well? They're both about robots, aren't they?! Sort of?)

Change Happens - Deal With It

There's a reason that you won't find too many recipes calling for fresh trilobite.

That's because none of the 20,000 or species of trilobites are around - and haven't been for around 248,000,000 years. I'm no expert - but I don't think that SUVs had anything to do with the Permian extinction.

The point is that change happens.

Runaway Defoliation and the Hummingbird Feeder

Right now, runaway defoliation is devastating central Minnesota's ecosystem even as I write. Although some trees are still green, even they show signs of wilting; many trees are no longer green, and leaves are falling uncontrollably from their branches; and some trees are completely bare!

If this alarming trend continues, soon there will not be a single leaf on any tree!

Sound silly? I hope so. Here in the northern tier of states, we go through this sort of thing every 365 days or so, starting sometime around the autumnal equinox. Some areas have a tourist trade centered around folks coming to see the fall colors.

The annual change of seasons happens so fast, and is so (comparatively) regular, that people can hardly help but be aware of it. We've become aware of an 11-year cycle in our sun's energy output; and there are tantalizing indications of long climate cycles, taking thousands to millions of years to run their course.

About the runaway defoliation that's denuding Minnesota's trees - and halting their contribution of oxygen to Earth's atmosphere - I'm not all that worried. I've been through this cycle dozens of times.

And, I'm quite certain that I didn't set off this cataclysmic ecological change by putting extra nectar in the hummingbird feeder, at the beginning of this month.

Related posts:

• "Bringing Back the Dinosaurs: Not a Crazy Idea Any More"
  (June 29, 2009)
• "Antarctic Ice Cap Didn't Get the Memo"
  (April 18, 2009)
• "Peta Protests on World of Warcraft - I am Not Making This Up"
  (April 17, 2009)
• "Ancient Antarctic Ecosystem: Isolated for Millions of Years"
  (April 16, 2009)
• "Big Changes on a Big Planet: Red Spot on Jupiter Has Company"
  (May 27, 2008)
• "Sunspots? What Sunspots?"
  (April 25, 2008)
• "'My Mind's Made Up: Don't Confuse Me With the Facts' "
  (March 3, 2008)
• "No Hope of Nobel Prize for This Lot: U.S. Senators and Global Warming"
  (December 25, 2007)
• "Stop Global Warming: Upgrade Trees?"
  (November 6, 2007)
• " 'Journey of Mankind:' 160,000 Years of Ups and Downs"
  (November 1, 2007)
• "Climate Data, Global Warming, and a Y2K Bug"
  (August 15, 2007)

Background:

• A Guide to the Orders of Trilobites
• Western Trilobite Association
• The Paleontological Society
• "about Trilobites"
  Fossil Mall
• "Permian"
  Timeline
• An overview of the last 4,500,000,000 or so years
  • "Hadean time: 4.5 to 3.8 billion years ago"
  • "Introduction to the Archaean 3.8 to 2.5 billion years ago"
  • "Introduction to the Proterozoic Era 2.5 billion to 543 million years ago"
    • "Introduction to the Vendian Period 650 to 543 Million Years Ago"
  • "The Paleozoic Era 543 to 248 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Cambrian Period 543 to 490 Million Years Ago"
      • "The Tommotian Age 530 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Ordovician 490 to 443 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Silurian 443 to 417 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Devonian 417 to 354 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Carboniferous 354 to 290 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Permian 290 to 248 Million Years Ago"
  • "Introduction to the Mesozoic Era 248 to 65 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Triassic Period 248 to 206 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Jurassic Period 206 to 144 Million Years Ago"
    • "The Cretaceous Period 144 to 65 Million Years Ago"
  • "Introduction to the Cenozoic 65 Million Years to the Present"
    • Tertiary (65 to 1.8 mya)
      • "The Paleocene Epoch 65 to 54.8 mya"
      • "The Eocene Epoch 54.8 to 33.7 mya"
      • "The Oligocene Epoch 33.7 to 23.8 mya"
      • "The Miocene Epoch 23.8 to 5.3 mya"
      • "The Pliocene Epoch 5.3 to 1.8 mya"
    • Quaternary (1.8 mya to today)
      • "The Pleistocene 1.8 million to ~10,000 years ago"
      • "The Holocene The last ~10,000 years"
  • News Time: The Last Few Days
    (Sources: University of California Museum of Paleontology and CNN)

---

More about change and getting a grip, at:

• "Change, American Culture, Trilobites, Humanity's History, and the Big Picture"

Antarctic Ice Cap Didn't Get the Memo

"Antarctic ice is growing, not melting away"
news.com.au (April 18, 2009)

• "Ice expanding in much of Antarctica"
• "Eastern coast getting colder"
• "Western section remains a concern"

"ICE is expanding in much of Antarctica, contrary to the widespread public belief that global warming is melting the continental ice cap.

"The results of ice-core drilling and sea ice monitoring indicate there is no large-scale melting of ice over most of Antarctica, although experts are concerned at ice losses on the continent's western coast. "

If you're into being scared silly over something, there's still hope: the Wilkins ice shelf isn't all that stable, and some of the western ice sheet is melting.

Meanwhile, over on the eastern part of Antarctica (I know: it's on the pole, but that's the conventional way of dividing the real estate), it's getting colder. That's where Australia has its slice of the Antarctic pie. Which probably explains why this article showed up in an Australian news outlet.

Near the end of the article is a remarkable couple of paragraphs:

"Dr Allison said there was not any evidence of significant change in the mass of ice shelves in east Antarctica nor any indication that its ice cap was melting. 'The only significant calvings in Antarctica have been in the west,' he said. And he cautioned that calvings of the magnitude seen recently in west Antarctica might not be unusual.

" 'Ice shelves in general have episodic carvings and there can be large icebergs breaking off - I'm talking 100km or 200km long - every 10 or 20 or 50 years.' "

Cycles in natural phenomena: who could have guessed?

Vaguely related posts:

• "Peta Protests on World of Warcraft - I am Not Making This Up"
  (April 17, 2009)
• "Ancient Antarctic Ecosystem: Isolated for Millions of Years"
  (April 16, 2009)
• "Big Changes on a Big Planet: Red Spot on Jupiter Has Company"
  (May 27, 2008)
• "Sunspots? What Sunspots?"
  (April 25, 2008)
• "'My Mind's Made Up: Don't Confuse Me With the Facts' "
  (March 3, 2008)
• "No Hope of Nobel Prize for This Lot: U.S. Senators and Global Warming"
  (December 25, 2007)
• "Stop Global Warming: Upgrade Trees?"
  (November 6, 2007)
• " 'Journey of Mankind:' 160,000 Years of Ups and Downs"
  (November 1, 2007)
• "Climate Data, Global Warming, and a Y2K Bug"
  (August 15, 2007)

Ancient Antarctic Ecosystem: Isolated for Millions of Years

"Ancient Ecosystem Found in Ice Pocket"
Discovery (April 16, 2009)

"Beneath a glacier in Antarctica, scientists have discovered a community of microbes growing in frigid pools of salty water.

"It's a particularly tough environment, with no light, no oxygen, and extremely cold temperatures. But the microbes appear to live -- and thrive -- off a combination of iron and sulfur, according to a new study. The result of that strange metabolism is a brilliant red streak of cascading ice called Blood Falls...."

This patch of anaerobic things is interesting because it's in an environment that's a bit like subsurface Europa (one of Jupiter's moons). And, since it's been isolated for millions of years, studying it may help biologists understand how life handles Earth's glacial periods.

Earth's climate isn't exactly stable. There have been a half-dozen major glacial periods in the last 1,000,000,000 years. Here's a rough chronology:

• 925,000,000 years ago
  • 125,000,000 years pass, then
• 800,000,000 years ago
  • 120,000,000 years pass, then
• 680,000,000 years ago
  • 230,000,000 years pass, then
• 450,000,000 years ago
  • 120,000,000 years pass, then
• 330,000,000 years ago
  • 328,000,000 years pass, then
• 2,000,000 years ago

It's too early to tell, but we may be coming out of the one that started about two million years ago. Or, maybe we're just in an interglacial period, with another big freeze on the way: I've read it both ways.

That ice age that started 800,000,000 years back, by the way, was a bad one: glaciers got to within 15 degrees of the equator.

Another thing: Those dates are rather approximate. One thing that keeps scientists busy is working out more accurate (or less inaccurate) ways of telling how long ago something happened. I got those numbers from the Glacier article on Encyclopedia of Earth: which are pretty close to other best-estimate approximations.

Attention Earthlings: Change Happens

Earth's a big place, with a long history. Quite a bit has changed since microorganisms started metabolizing CO₂, with O₂ as a byproduct.

When I was growing up, civilization was going to end when the next ice age started. Now, there's another version of 'and we're all gonna die' making the rounds. I don't know what the Earth my great-great-great-great grandchildren live on will be like, but I'm pretty sure that it won't be exactly the way it is now.

Change happens.

Related posts

• "Life is Left-Handed on Earth (Caution: Geeky Content)"
  (March 23, 2009)
• "The Purple Hills of Earth?"
  (September 6, 2008)
• "How to Destroy Earth (It Ain't Gonna be Easy)"
  (July 9, 2008)
• "Old Articles About Old Stuff: History of Earth's Continents"
  (May 18, 2008)
• "The Sun as a Swinger? Cardiff U's Title is Better for Mass Extinction Article"
  (May 12, 2008)
• "Sunspots? What Sunspots?"
  (April 25, 2008)
• "And Now, for Something Completely Different: The Medieval Climatic Optimum, The Little Ice Age, and Other Changes"
  (April 20, 2008)
• " 'My Mind's Made Up: Don't Confuse Me With the Facts' "
  (March 3, 2008)
• "Climates in the Inner Solar System"
  (February 28, 2008)
• ""Journey of Mankind:" 160,000 Years of Ups and Downs"
  (November 1, 2007)

More at

• "Glacier"
  Encyclopedia of Earth
• "Fossile Mysteries"
  San Diego Natural History Museum
  • Timeline of Earth's most recent 2,500,000,000,years

Creepy Crawlies in Antarctica: Tundra Tales

"Fossils Reveal Much Warmer Antarctic in Recent Past"
FOXNews (July 23, 2008)

"A college student's new discovery of fossils collected in the East Antarctic suggests that the frozen polar cap was once a much balmier place.

"The well-preserved fossils of ostracods, a type of small crustacean, came from the Dry Valleys region of Antarctica's Transantarctic Mountains and date from about 14 million years ago. The fossils were a rare find, showing all of the ostracods' soft anatomy in 3-D...."

Okay: 14 million years ago probably isn't your idea of "recent past," but we're looking at geological time scales here. It looks like Earth cooled off, a lot, about 14 million years back - with catastrophic effects on Antarctica's ecosystem.

Photos of Antarctic Huts

" Scott and Shackleton's abandoned huts in Antarctica"
Fogonazos / Asombros diarios (March 31, 2008)

An interesting collection of photos and text about abandoned huts in Antarctica.

One of the photos, presumably an interior of a Shackleton expedition hut, shows quite anachronistic - and unexplained - technology.

There's also a discussion in the comments of an 'is to - is not' sort.

However, this post is a good reminder of "the heroic age of Antarctic exploration."

Ancient Antarctic Lake: Catch-22 for Scientists

"Mystery of Antarctica's 15-Million Year-Old Lake" discusses a long-buried lake in Antarctica, and issues involved in studying it.

The article isn't for everyone: but I like it, and you may, too.