Australian researchers discover huge lakes under the largest glacier in East Antarctic | News from the world

Australian researchers have discovered huge underwater lakes under the largest glacier in eastern Antarctica.

Scientists detected the lakes by projecting small explosives 2 m below the surface of the Totten Glacier and listening to the reflected sound.

Dr. Ben Galton-Fenzi, a glaciologist from the Australian Antarctic Division, said that this research was essential to help scientists predict how melting glaciers in the Antarctic would alter the world's oceans.

The Totten glacier is 30 km wide and two kilometers thick. It can potentially raise the sea level by seven meters.

"Explosives were a source of sound for us … and that would then echo on different layers of the ice," Galton-Fenzi told The Guardian.

"We have placed geophones [a series of microphones] on the surface of the glacier to listen to the reflected sound, giving us an image of what is hiding under the ice. "

He said that the speed of movement of glaciers is determined by what they're going through.

"If there is a bedrock under the glacier, it is sticky and will move more slowly, but if there is water or loose sediment, the glacier will move faster" , did he declare.

Galton-Fenzi said the next step for researchers would be to explore a sample of lakes, but he lamented the lack of certainty about funding for future research.

"This is the main problem we face and we must respond to over the next two decades," he said.

"I'm not just a scientist who says, 'I need more money' … I have children six and eight years old and [climate change] is a real threat to them. "

The scientists, based at the Casey Research Station, were among the more than 550 shippers who traveled with the Australian Antarctic Program during the austral summer, working on more than 56 projects.