Unknown Life Forms Found in Sub-Antarctic Waters

Russian researchers have discovered bacteria yet unknown to science in a water sample drawn from the subglacial Lake Vostok in Antarctica.

The DNA of the bacteria does not coincide with that of any bacteria documented yet, reports ITAR-TASS.

Lake Vostok is the largest of Antarctica's hundreds of subglacial lakes.

It is located below Russia's Vostok Station, under some 4 km thick ice in the continent's East Ice Sheet.

Researchers succeeded in drilling a probe through the thick ice cover only in 2012. Studies are still under way of the water sample collected.

The discovery is significant, as researchers hypothesized that due to its almost complete isolation, Lake Vostok could house unusual or very old life forms.

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