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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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"Hidden below the surface of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, there is a vast mass of liquid water generated by the heating of Earth and frictional melting." That's how Winnie Chu, assistant professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, begins her Perspectives editorial in Science with a look at a new study showing observations of saline groundwater saturating a sedimentary basin beneath the Whillans Ice Stream in West Antarctica. Chu, who is researching a potentially similar situation in Greenland, says the Antarctica reservoir is estimated to contain a water volume more than 10 times greater than that in the overlaying subglacial hydrologic system. "This finding highlights groundwater hydrology as a potentially critical piece in understanding the effect of water flow on Antarctic ice sheet dynamics," Chu writes.
