The waters hold the danger that they may raise sea levels worldwide in a warming climate.
The team has discovered for the first time ever a huge, actively circulating groundwater system in deep sediments in West Antarctica.
"People have hypothesized that there could be deep groundwater in these sediments, but up to now, no one has done any detailed imaging," said in the press release the lead author of the study, Chloe Gustafson, who did the research as a graduate student at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.
"The amount of groundwater we found was so significant, it likely influences ice-stream processes. Now we have to find out more and figure out how to incorporate that into models."As exciting as the discovery is, it also indicates some dangers related to today's climate crisis. The researchers warn that
most of Antarctica's sedimentary basins currently lie below current sea level, meaning that if the ice shelves were to pull back in a warming climate, ocean waters could re-invade the sediments, and the glaciers behind them could rush forward, "Antarctica contains 57 meters of sea-level rise potential, so we want to make sure we are incorporating all of the processes that control how ice flows off of the continent and into the oceans.