Beneath Antarctica's Ice, Intriguing Evidence of Lost Continents

By Stephanie Pappas, Live Science Contributor  

 

Beneath the Antarctic ice lie the remnants of "lost" continents.

Credit: Vipersniper/iStock/Getty Images Plus

A new map reveals the remnants of ancient continents lurking beneath Antarctica's ice.
The map shows that East Antarctica is made up of multiple cratons, which are the cores of continents that came before, according to study leader Jörg Ebbing, a geoscientist at Kiel University in Germany.

"This observation leads back to the break-up of the supercontinent Gondwana and the link of Antarctica to the surrounding continents," Ebbing told Live Science. The findings help reveal fundamental facts about Earth's tectonics and how Antarctica's land and ice sheets interact, he wrote in an email. [Antarctica: The Ice-Covered Bottom of the World (Photos)]...https://www.livescience.com/64073-lost-continents-beneath-antarctic-ice.html