During 35th  and 40th CHINARE in 2018 and 2023, the Institute for Polar Science and Engineering and the Polar Research Center of Jilin University carried out subglacial bedrock core drilling on the flank of Dalk Glacier in Antarctica with the non-pipe ice and bedrock drilling equipment independently developed by Jilin University. During the 35th Antarctic expedition, it successfully drilled 198 meters, drilled through the ice sheet, and successfully obtained 6cm of subglacial bedrock core, which was the first time for China to drill the subglacial bedrock core in Antarctica, and became the third country to complete the subglacial coring after Russia and the United States. The successful drilling of subglacial bedrock in Antarctica is also the first subglacial bedrock core in East Antarctica in the past 60 years, which was reported by main media of China and at foreign countries such as “Nature”, CCTV, and Xinhua News Agency. This indicates that China's subglacial bedrock drilling technology has reached the international advanced level. During 40th CHINARE, Jilin University, China University of Geosciences (Beijing) and the All-Russian Institute of Oceanography, Geology and Mineral Resources of Russia formed a joint expedition team, which applied the system to drill through the 545 meters ice sheet again in the subglacial magnetic anomaly area of Dalk Glacier in the Larsman Hills, and successfully drilled 0.48 meters of subglacial bedrock. This is the deepest subglacial bedrock drilling project which successfully bedrock cored in the East Antarctica so far, and it is also the first time in the world to conduct targeted geological survey drilling sampling in the deep subglacial bedrock of the Antarctica.

The subglacial bedrock drilling site (35th CHINARE)

Bedrock cores drilled from beneath the Antarctic ice sheet

Subglacial bedrock core (35th CHINARE)

The subglacial bedrock drilling site (40th CHINARE)

China-Russia drilling team

Subglacial bedrock core (40th CHINARE)