Volcanic vents found in Antarctic waters
Southampton, England (UPI) Feb 14, 2011
British researchers say the discovery of deep-sea volcanic vents in the Antarctic's Southern Ocean suggests they're more common than previously thought.
Deep-sea vents are hot springs on the seafloor, where mineral-rich water nourishes colonies of microbes and animals.
Around 250 such vents have been discovered worldwide in the three decades since scientists first encountered them in the Pacific. Most have been found on a chain of undersea volcanoes called the mid-ocean ridge but very few are known in the Antarctic, a release from the U.K. National Oceanography Center said Monday.
Scientists aboard the Royal Research Ship James Cook, using an underwater camera system, found slender 10-foot-tall mineral towers with shimmering hot water gushing from their peaks, and gossamer-like white mats of bacteria coating their sides.
"When we caught the first glimpse of the vents, the excitement was almost overwhelming," Leigh Marsh, a University of Southampton doctoral student, said.
The vents were found at a depth of 1,700 feet in a newly discovered seafloor crater close to the South Sandwich Islands, a remote group of islands about 300 miles southeast of South Georgia.
Researchers say they hope their study of the new vents will add to their understanding of the distribution and evolution of life in the deep ocean, the role deep-sea vents play in controlling the chemistry of the oceans, and the diversity of life that can thrive in different conditions in the ocean depths.
Share This Article With Planet Earth
Beyond the Ice Age
Gloucester Point VA (SPX) Jan 21, 2011
Researcher Walker Smith of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, College of William and Mary, has been conducting shipboard studies of biological productivity in Antarctica's Ross Sea for the last three decades. This year he's letting underwater robots do some of the work. Smith and graduate student Xiao Liu are using a two-year grant from the National Science Foundation to deploy an ... read more
|The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2010 - SpaceDaily. AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any Web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy Statement|