>Date: Tue, 3 Aug 1999 23:24:18 -0400 (EDT)
>From: Julie Edwards <jedwards@umich.edu>
>X-Sender: jedwards@qix.rs.itd.umich.edu
>To: europa@klx.com
>Subject: [pr9947] - News Releases (fwd)
>Sender: owner-europa@klx.com
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>---------- Forwarded message ----------
>Date: Tue, 3 Aug 1999 20:35:26 -0400 (EDT)
>From: NSF Custom News Service <cns-admin@nsf.gov>
>To: CNS Subscribers <cns-subscribers@nsf.gov>
>Subject: [pr9947] - News Releases
>
>The following document (pr9947) is now available from
>the NSF Online Document System
>
> Title: Ice-Covered Antarctic Lake May Harbor Unknown Life
> Type: News Releases
> Subtype: Polar Programs
>
>
>
>It may be found at:
>
> http://www.nsf.gov/cgi-bin/getpub?pr9947
>
>
>Full text follows.
>
> ---------------------------- CUT HERE ----------------------------
>Title: Ice-Covered Antarctic Lake May Harbor Unknown Life
>Date: August 3, 1999
>
>
>
> Media contacts:
> August 3, 1999
> Peter West
> NSF PR 99-47
> (703) 306-1070/pwest@nsf.gov
> Margie Turrin
> (914) 365-8494/mkt@ldeo.columbia.edu
>
> Program contact:
> Julie Palais
> (703) 306-1033/jpalais@nsf.gov
>
> ICE-COVERED ANTARCTIC LAKE MAY HARBOR UNKNOWN LIFE
>
> Microbes entirely unknown to science may exist in liquid water in
> Lake Vostok, thousands of meters beneath the Antarctic ice sheet. That
> possibility is one of several intriguing mysteries that justify
> undertaking the logistical challenges of exploring the lake, according
> to a new report from a workshop funded by the National Science
> Foundation (NSF).
>
> The report, "Lake Vostok: A Curiosity or a Focus for
> Interdisciplinary Study," concludes that the lake "may represent a
> unique region for detailed scientific investigation" for several
> reasons. Among them is the possibility that conditions under the ice
> may approximate those on Europa, a frozen moon of Jupiter, and so may
> indicate whether life may be able to exist in harsh conditions
> elsewhere in the solar system.
>
> The report represents the conclusions reached by scientists from
> a variety of fields who met in Washington D.C. last November. The
> Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University and the
> University of Hawaii jointly organized the meeting.
>
> Lake Vostok is roughly the size of Lake Ontario in the United
> States. Vostok Station -- a Russian scientific outpost, which once
> recorded the lowest temperature on earth (-126.9 degrees Fahrenheit)
> -- is located in the vicinity of the lake. As part of a joint U.S.,
> French and Russian research project, Russian teams have drilled down
> into the ice covering the lake, producing the world's deepest ice
> core. But drilling was deliberately stopped roughly 120 meters above
> where the ice and liquid water meet to prevent possible contamination.
>
> The report concludes that Lake Vostok merits further scientific
> investigation, including devising a way to drill through the ice sheet
> to reach the water -- and lake-bottom sediments -- without
> contaminating them.
>
> The report notes that that there are several reasons other than
> the possibility of discovering unknown forms of life for exploring the
> lake. Water below the ice, which has been cut off from the outside
> world for hundreds of thousands of years, may have a unique chemical
> composition. There may also be an active tectonic rift below the lake,
> which may be warming its waters. Or sediments at the lake bottom may
> contain a record of ancient climate conditions.
>
> Robin E. Bell, a geophysicist and a co-editor of the report, says
> it "illustrates the emerging importance of the lake for understanding
> the processes which may have triggered the evolutionary explosion on
> earth and perhaps on other planets as well as deciphering the geologic
> history of Antarctica."
>
> NSF's Office of Polar Programs, through the U.S. Antarctic
> Program (USAP), coordinates all U.S. scientific research on the
> continent. NSF will send a delegation of U.S. scientists to represent
> the consensus of opinion contained in the report at a meeting of the
> international Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR),
> scheduled for September in Cambridge, England.
>
> At that meeting, scientists will discuss the scientific
> objectives of sub-glacial lake exploration and will examine the
> logistical and engineering requirements for exploring the lake.
>
> The SCAR meeting also will assess the risk of contamination posed
> by various exploration techniques and will consider a schedule for
> accomplishing the scientific goal of exploring the lake.
>
> -NSF-
>
> Editors: For copies of the report, in PDF and Postscript formats, see:
> http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/vostok/
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------- CUT HERE ----------------------------
>
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