U.S. scientists using satellite data have established a more accurate figure of the amount of annual sea level rise from melting glaciers and ice caps which should aid studies on how quickly coastal areas may flood as global warming gathers pace.

A Russian team has succeeded in drilling through four kilometres (2.5 miles) of ice to the surface of a mythical subglacial Antarctic lake which could hold as yet unknown life forms, reports said Monday. Lake Vostok is the largest subglacial lake in Antarctica and scientists want to study its eco-system which has been isolated for hundreds of thousands of years under the ice in the hope of finding previously unknown microbiological life forms.
Surface reached

After more than two decades of drilling in Antarctica, Russian scientists have reached the surface of a gigantic freshwater lake hidden under miles of ice for some 20 million years, a lake that may hold life from the distant past and clues to search for life on other planets. Reaching Lake Vostok is a major discovery avidly anticipated by scientists around the world hoping that it may allow a glimpse into microbial life forms, not visible to the naked eye, that existed before the Ice Age.

Bangladesh is taking part in a climate change expedition to Antarctica to explore and highlight the pace and alarming impacts of greenhouse pollution unfolding even in the world's most remote frozen continent.

Al Gore, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and former US vice president, is leading the 116-member expedition, “A Voyage to the Bottom of the Earth”, to see firsthand and let the world know how fast the climate bell is ticking.

The melting down of the Himalayan glaciers due to climate change may be solving the current water crisis, but can also have a devastating effect on animal and human lives in the long run, environmentalist and polar explorer Robert Swan has said. “What scares me is that people think that it is fine for the glaciers to melt. What they need to realise is that getting so much of water through melting glaciers can have hazardous effects in the future,” Swan said.

Developed for troops serving on glaciers high in the Himalayas, the non-flushing “bio-digester” toilet made by India’s top defence research body is now being offered to companies and poorer states. It is one of 200 technologies produced by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) identified as for-sale via the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).

The root of the mysterious range of Antarctic mountains completely hidden under the continent’s massive ice sheet may be over 200 million years old, dating back to the dinosaur age, scientists have claimed.
Researchers, on a project to understand the Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains in east Antarctica better, said the mountains rise up to 10,000 feet above the planet’s surface, but are covered by up to 15,750 feet of ice.