Ice blankets about 98 percent of Antarctica, concealing nearly all of its land beneath a frozen shell. But thanks to remarkable advances in imaging technology, scientists can now reveal what the continent truly looks like beneath all that ice.

The Bedmap2 was created back in 2013 using vast amounts of data on surface elevation, ice thickness, and bedrock topography collected by NASA and the British Antarctic Survey from satellites, aircraft, and surface-based surveys.

As the map shows, the naked land beneath the Antarctic ice sheet is a rugged land, covered in mountain ranges, gorges, and jagged terrain. Remarkably, one part of the bed found under the Byrd Glacier in Victoria Land is 2,870 meters below sea level, making it the lowest point on any of the Earth's continental plates.

Understanding the shape of this subglacial world is important as it impacts how ice is distributed and influences how it will melt in the face of rising oceans and air temperatures linked to climate change.

The Bedmap2 data reveal that Antarctica harbors 27 million cubic kilometers of frozen water that, if melted, would result in around 58 meters of sea-level rise. 

While the entire Antarctic ice sheet is not predicted to totally melt under current climate projections, it’s painfully clear that it is slowly thawing at a shocking rate. The latest estimates suggest the world's oceans are now rising by 4 millimeters each year as a result of thawing ice sheets in Antarctica and Greenland.

To gain a better understanding of ice thickness and the world beneath Antarctica, scientists are now building the next-generation map, Bedmap3.

Source: Nature

Image: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center