Hidden from my view. In a hidden world beneath Antarctica, ‘icy fingers of death’ reach the ocean floor

The researchers showed these frozen death claws hidden under the ice and said they could freeze any living thing they could reach.

The ocean is vast and holds many secrets: from species unknown to scientists hidden in the darkest waters to the icy fingers of death hidden under Antarctica’s ice, IFLScience writes.

The researchers showed incredible columns of ice hidden under the sea ice and slowly reaching the bottom of the ocean. Scientists call them brinicles, and although they visually remind us of stalactites that form in caves, these wonderful underwater pillars have more in common with hydrothermal vents.

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According to scientists, these amazing ice forms are formed when salts in water are separated from pure ice crystals during the formation of polar ice. They can also form entire pockets – tiny channels filled with extremely salty brine in cracks in sea ice. Over time, this salty water can be hidden under the ice and seep into the open sea.

Additional salts make it heavier than the surrounding water and therefore sink. Also, this salt water is colder than the surrounding water and therefore draws heat from whatever it can reach. As a result of this process, a certain sinking brine column is formed, resembling the icy fingers of death. Sometimes these frozen forms can even reach the bottom of the ocean if there is enough salt water and no strong currents to destroy the salt water.

The researchers note that these formations have a very majestic appearance, but for the ocean’s bottom dwellers they seem more like “icy fingers of death” because they can destroy all life that touches them in the process.

In 2013, scientists conducted a study that showed that brinicles actually have nothing to do with stalactites. At the time, researchers said it would make more sense to think of them as “inverted chemical gardens.” The researchers also found that the formation process actually has more in common with the formation of mud volcanoes and hydrothermal vents.

Meanwhile, some researchers believe that brinicles may have played an important role in shaping life on Earth. It is hypothesized that the extraction of salt from sea ice may have created conditions that align with the origin of life.

Previously Focus He wrote that there is a “pipeline” under Antarctica’s ice sheet: it stretches for 460 km and is accelerating melting.

Source: Focus

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