Our Communications Earth & Environment study presents evidence that glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs) may provide biological stimuli to carbon dioxide-depleted benthic ecosystems in perennially ice-covered Antarctic lakes and perhaps even in icy lakes on early Mars.

Acidity is an important aerosol property, as it impacts numerous physicochemical properties. However, models either neglect to include aerosol acidity, or have not been robustly tested for various environments. We show that the atmosphere is generally acidic, and models miss this important feature.