The 'unknown bacterium' from Lake Vostok
Russian drillers reached Lake Vostok's water on 5–6 February 2012; in 2013 Russian scientists reported an unknown bacterium in the refrozen samples, and a US team led by Scott Rogers reported 3,507 gene sequences from the lake's accretion ice.
2013 CE · -78.47, 106.80 · status: disputed
The account
Some sequences resembled bacteria from fish guts, which suggested to Rogers a complex ecosystem. The Russian lab head Vladimir Korolev said the 'new' bacterium might be a contaminant that feeds on kerosene, and microbiologists such as David Pearce warned that drilling fluid (about 60 tonnes of kerosene and Freon) had contaminated the borehole. In 2017 the Russian team said reliable data on the lake's biology could not yet be obtained.
The sceptical view
Contamination from drilling fluid is the leading explanation; the lake's life, if any, is still unknown.
The researched reading
The lake is real and may well hold life, but the reported organisms most likely include contamination from drilling. Whether Lake Vostok is inhabited remains undetermined until clean samples are taken.
| Explanation | Weight | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Something in the surroundings | 50% | The borehole held about 60 tonnes of kerosene and Freon, and lake water surged up into it; the Russian lab head himself said the unknown bacterium could be a kerosene-eating contaminant. |
| A known natural phenomenon | 22% | Genuine microbes in an isolated lake are plausible: Lake Whillans, sampled cleanly in 2013, holds thousands of kinds of microbes. |
| Undetermined | 20% | In 2017 the Russian team said reliable biological data could not yet be obtained; a clean sample has never been taken. |
| Something known, misidentified | 8% | Database gaps can make a known but poorly sequenced organism look new. |
| A hoax or fabrication | 0% | No evidence of fabrication; the claims were published by working scientists. Later fiction such as Organism 46-B is a separate matter. |
Official position: The Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute reported in 2017 that samples were too contaminated to describe the lake’s biology reliably.
Connections in the atlas
- ALH84001: 'fossils' from Mars
- 'Organism 46-B' and the secret under Antarctica
- Life found in Subglacial Lake Whillans
- Lake Vostok, the lake under four kilometres of ice