Antarctic Great Lake Glimpsed

UPDATE (16 February 2012,  12:55 pm):  A few follow-up pieces have been posted in the past couple days (see here and here; Nature News has another story with a great accompanying graphic that depicts the drilling operation in better scale; and a nod to Knight Sci Journalism Tracker for keeping an eye on this and collecting the various stories). They provide more context as to why scientists are interested in studying  subglacial lakes. They also discuss the friendly competition among the Russian group (who, though they are the first team to drill to such a lake, haven't yet sampled the water) and separate British and American teams, each of whom are evidently vying to be the first to actually collect subglacial lake water (all from different lakes, importantly). Though the latter two are getting a much later start on drilling, they plan to use hot water drills that can bore through ice at a much faster clip than the mechanical counterpart used by the Russian team. (I can't say it with certainty, but my guess is that the hot water drill(s) they intend to use are similar to those used in constructing the IceCube neutrino observatory near the South Pole, about which I recently wrote for EARTH Magazine. The IceCube hot water drills could bore 2.5-kilometer-deep holes in just a couple days.)

Regardless of who actually samples Antarctic subglacial lake water first--or perhaps rather, who analyzes and publicizes/publishes their results first--my humble opinion is that all the teams, if they can successfully collect samples, are likely to produce individually important findings. After all, there's no guarantee that all the lakes they're attempting to access feature identical conditions or, if present, identical microbial colonies. Each could provide different insights, contributing to a broader picture of the subglacial aqueous environment. Hopefully, when the time comes, whoever covers the story will bear this in mind.

Original Post:

A team of Russian scientists has managed at long last to finish drilling through 3,769 meters of ice below the East Antarctic Ice Sheet to the surface of a buried freshwater lake dubbed Lake Vostok. The achievement, likened in significance to man’s first flight into space by the head of the Russian Antarctic Expedition, opens for study an ancient massive lake — 250 kilometers long by 50 kilometers at its widest — that is thought to have been covered by ice for the last 15 to 20 million years.

A Bit of Bilingual Science Outreach

When you can’t bring the masses to science, bring science to the masses. At least that’s the approach recently for many science outreach programs, including Explorando las Ciencias, or Exploring the Sciences, a bilingual community event held Oct. 23 on Madison’s south side that catered to both Spanish and English speakers. 

Good news for Webb Space Telescope; Bad news for other scientists?

A full-size model of the James Webb Space Telescope outside Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. (Image credit: NASA)

Perhaps for this post I should temporarily rename the blog to Plus AND Minus Science. Allow me to explain …

Last week, the Senate Commerce, Justice and Science Appropriations Subcommittee released its recommendations for FY2012 funding (pdf) for the various departments and agencies it oversees. Of note for us science types are details about NIST, NSF and, of course … [drumroll] … NASA! So how do the numbers look? Well, not great at first glance, although “not great” might be the best that could have been hoped for given the current economic climate. The biggest (proportional) hit is taken by NIST, which would see its 2012 funding cut by 9.3 percent compared to 2011 levels and by over 30 percent relative to the administration’s request. By comparison, the other agencies fair well: the recommendations would see NSF’s budget cut by 2.4 percent relative to 2011 and 13.7 percent below the 2012 request, while NASA’s would be lowered by 2.8 and 4.2 percent, respectively. So those are some of the minuses. But where do the pluses come in (other than suggesting that the cuts aren’t as bad as they could be)?

Fun with SAP (super absorbent polymer)

Recently I've been having the urge to play with (science) toys.  The way I see it, there are three probable explanations:

1) I need a creative outlet for my inner, hands-on geek (since I don't work in a lab anymore).
2) I am secretly jealous every year when I buy sciencey toys as gifts for my nieces and nephews every year.
3) It is a reaction to this whole aging business.

Regardless of the root cause(s), sometimes you just have to look yourself in the eye and say,  

"I need to buy that packet of Grow Snow hanging from a display in the grocery store cereal aisle.  Better yet, make it two packets...for my sanity."

Followed by,

"And now I need to play with it."

With that said, please enjoy the fruits of my self-indulgence...

'Keep Looking Up': An Overdue Ode to Jack Horkheimer

(Credit: NASA and ESA; obtained via Wikimedia Commons and subsequently adapted.)

"Confused about the cosmos?  Can’t tell a planet from a star?  Then give us just five minutes, and we’ll show you what they are.”

So says the introduction to Star Gazer, the televised short that each week showcases current sightseeing opportunities for the backyard astronomer—from streaking comets to unusual celestial alignments.

I don’t recall ever seeking out Star Gazer, which has aired on public television since 1976.  Never recorded it, never Tivo-ed it, never made a note to watch it.  Its brief five-minute duration (or the still shorter one-minute condensed version) and irregular placement between full-length programs or immediately preceding PBS’ late night signoff would make it difficult to do so anyhow. 

On the rare occasions, however, when my TV-watching trajectory does coincide with the program’s appearance, I find it almost as enthralling as if it were a solar eclipse or a supermoon itself.  This is as much the case now as it was when I was younger.

When it came on shortly before 1 a.m. central time the other night, after a performance by Spoon on Austin City Limits and just before PBS went dark for the evening, true to form, my hand froze on the remote, and I had the same reaction as I always do:

Shake, rattle, and roll...to scale

Last week was spring break here in Madison, WI.  It’s been a while since I took part in the annual mass exodus, but I decided to take advantage of the time off, pack up, and get out of Dodge for a few days.  My destination was chilly, drizzly Seattle for an in-person crash course about the study of earthquakes and their associated dangers in the Puget Sound area.  I also went out to meet some of the people—both professional scientists and volunteer citizens—who are helping this effort along.

Spring Break 2011!  Downtown Seattle as seen from West Seattle across Elliott Bay.

The timing of my trip during the week after Japan’s subduction-related magnitude 9.0 Tohuku earthquake and the resulting tsunami, and not long after a shallow crustal temblor hit Christchurch, NZ, was purely coincidental.  It did, however, provide an engaging, albeit tragic, backdrop for discussing earthquake hazards in the area and individual motivations for contributing to the study of these hazards.  The susceptibility of the Puget Sound to both of these types of earthquakes, as well as to large deep earthquakes such as the 2001 Nisqually quake, and the parallels to these recent events is not lost on many in the region.

Kaboom! An undersea volcano blows its top…

This spectacular video of an erupting undersea volcano recently came through the geoscience grapevine, and thought I would share it here.  Enjoy!

According to the anonymous voice accompanying the video, the volcano is Kavachi (9.02° S 157.95° E), near the Solomon Islands.  The eruptive history of Kavachi has been recorded since 1939 and numerous periods of volcanism have been documented in that time.  Although the date of this video is uncertain, the most recent known eruption occurred in early April 2007 following a magnitude 8.1 earthquake.  Kavachi has emerged above the ocean surface to form an island on nine occasions, only to subside again due to erosion.