ENDURANCE, the Environmentally Non-Disturbing Under-ice Robotic Antarctic Explorer, is about to start its second round of operations in Antarctica’s Lake Bonney. ENDURANCE researchers began their journey to the Ice in early October.

ENDURANCE is a project of NASA’s Astrobiology Science and Technology for Exploring Planets (ASTEP) program. ASTEP Principal Investigator Peter Doran of the University of Illinois-Chicago is leading the ENDURANCE project, in collaboration with Stone Aerospace and others.

ENDURANCE is an underwater robotic probe designed to explore the biological and geochemical composition of an ice-bound Antarctic lake. This project is intended to demonstrate a concept that may prove useful in the search for life on other planetary bodies where ice is known to exist.

In February 2008, as a prelude to full-blown field operations in Antarctica, Doran’s team conducted a field demonstration of ENDURANCE in an ice-covered lake in Madison, Wisconsin, before taking the robot to Antarctica for its first round of operations there.

One of the primary goals of the ENDURANCE project is to map the Antarctica’s West Lake Bonney, a two-and-a-half mile long, one-mile wide, 130 foot-deep lake located in the continent’s Dry Valleys. The lake is perpetually covered with 12 to 15 feet of ice.