UnLocked Lakery

The story starts with a description of the scientists' plans to explore these underground lakes in Antarctica. The idea that these are each home to separately evolved, and closed, ecosystems, once a driving force of biological research is now being found unlikely.

The simple fact that liquid water exists thanks to the planet's internal heat, despite the temp of the atmosphere is still incredibly cool to me.

Satellite data

The latest research was carried out by scientists at the Natural Environment Research Council (Nerc) Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling (CPOM) at UCL, the University of Bristol and University of Cambridge.

They took ultra-precise measurements of a region in East Antarctica - home to some of the oldest, thickest ice on the continent - using radars on the European Space Agency's ERS-2 satellite.

The satellite found synchronous changes in the surface height at several locations hundreds of kilometres apart.

"To find a whole section - 30km (18 miles) by 10km (6 miles) - had dropped vertically was a great surprise," Professor Wingham explained.

"We then found another similar event 300km (186 miles) away, but that bit had increased instead of decreasing.

"We were then left with the problem of explaining what was going on. Movement of water was the only mechanism conceivable."

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