2023-10-24 17:38:42
“The land beneath the East Antarctic ice sheet is less well known than the surface of Mars. » mrallen / stock.adobe.com
Researchers have mapped an area buried under more than 2 km of ice, in the eastern part of Antarctica.
It’s a « relict landscape ». A land of ancient valleys and ridges carved by rivers, then frozen in ice for millions of years, that researchers discovered beneath the thick East Antarctic ice sheet. Their work is published Tuesday in the scientific journal Nature Communications.
« The land beneath the East Antarctic ice sheet is less well known than the surface of Mars »says in a press release Stewart Jamieson, researcher at the British University of Durham and lead author of the study. We certainly know the highest peaks and the deepest basins, but a major part of this surface remains mysterious. The scientific team therefore wanted to map part of this territory, over 32,000 km2, using satellite data but also an echo sounding system: « An airborne radar sends radio waves that pass through the ice until they reach something more solid…
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