Antarctica may hide cosmic secrets in a layer of meteorites just below its surface - CNET

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Scientists are salivating over new discoveries about the history of our solar system that could be made by way of a potential layer of meteorites trapped less than two feet below the surface of Antarctic ice fields.

Though meteorites fall pretty evenly over the entire globe, it's estimated that more than two-thirds of those collected have come from the southe continent, partly because it's so easy to spot the dark space rocks resting on the white surface of the landscape. The way the ice on the continent thaws, refreezes and flows also plays a role by basically pushing the meteorites toward the surface into concentrated regions known as "meteorite stranding zones."

The type of meteorites that have been found over the years on Antarctica, however, have not been as iron-rich as the fallen space rocks found across the rest of the world. A team at the University of Manchester has shown in a paper published in Nature Communications on Tuesday that more metallic meteorites are likely there but are hiding just below the surface.

Using lab experiments and mathematical models, the team showed that the iron-rich meteorites could be absorbing more heat from the sun, causing them to warm the surrounding ice and sink a foot or so, making them harder to see but still relatively easy to reach.

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These meteorites may lie there in the ice in a perfectly preserved state for thousands of years, a kind of cosmic history book literally frozen in time.