Arc volcanoes are wetter than previously thought, with scientific and economic implications

by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

The percentage of water in arc volcanoes, which form above subduction zones, may be far more than many previous studies have calculated.

This increased amount of water has broad implications for understanding how Earth's lower crust forms, how magma erupts through the crust, and how economically important mineral ore deposits form, according to a new paper published in Nature Geoscience.

The estimated water concentrations in primitive arc magmas from this study are more variable and significantly higher than the average of about four weight percent of water found in other studies, according to the paper. The results show that primitive arc magmas may contain ~0.6–10wt% H2O and may reach H2O saturation of ~20wt% H2O after extensive crystal fractionation in the lower arc crust, the paper adds.

"The big picture here is that water is essentially the lubricant of plate tectonics. The water content is going to affect all sorts of different parameters involved in how tectonic plates move," says lead author Benjamin Urann, who was a doctoral student in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)—WHOI Joint Program in Oceanography/Applied Ocean Science and Engineering at the time of the study.

"Being able to get some idea of what the actual water content of the arc magmas is, which is what we did in this study, can help refine estimates of how much water is being subducted deep into the mantle globally; quantify different water reservoirs on Earth, including surface and deep water reservoirs; and better understand the transport between these different reservoirs," says Urann, who is currently a National Science Foundation Ocean Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Wyoming. Urann added that the paper also discusses the implications of water content for forming economically important ore deposits, such as porphyry copper deposits. These deposits make up about 60% of the world's source of copper, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Many earlier studies have relied on techniques such as measuring melt inclusions—which are tiny droplets of magma that have been trapped by a crystals that grows around them—and measuring lava and other volcanic deposits that have erupted to the Earth's surface. "However, these methods have inherent limitations that obfuscate the full range of H2O in arc magmas," the paper states.

Urann and his Ph.D. supervisor, Véronique Le Roux, who is a co-author of the paper, developed methods with the Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry instrument located at WHOI to measure water content in minerals, with their work building on other efforts that suggested that arc magmas should contain significantly more H2O than inferred from melt-inclusion measurements.

The researchers determined that instead of examining lava samples that have erupted to the Earth's surface, it would be fruitful to examine deep crustal magmas that have not lost too much of their water content.

"Although you can't retrieve the liquid magma at these depths, what you may be able to sample is a cumulate: it is magma that has solidified at depth in the crust. We're lucky enough that sometimes with plate tectonics, some of those really deep crusts are exhumed at the surface," says Le Roux, associate scientist in the Geology and Geophysics department at WHOI, and Faculty member of the MIT-WHOI Joint Program. The researchers used cumulates that the paper's co-authors had collected from the Kohistan paleo-arc terrane in the Himalaya Mountain range in northwestern Pakistan.

Instead of examining surface rocks that travel far up through the crust as magma, and lose much of their water content in the process, the researchers examined magma—lower crustal cumulates—that had crystallized deep down in the crust at a high enough pressure to retain their original water content signature.

Le Roux says that "analyzing water in cumulate minerals is a new promising approach to access the deep levels of the crust in subduction zones."

The researchers calculated that the magma they analyzed contained between 10-20 weight percent of water depending on the magma's composition. "While this weight percent of water had been predicted experimentally as being possible, it had never been shown on natural samples," Le Roux said.

"The bottom line is that arc magmas can be wetter than we thought," said Urann.Advanced computer simulations reveal intriguing insights on magma deep below Earth's surface

More information: Benjamin Urann, High water content of arc magmas recorded in cumulates from subduction zone lower crust, Nature Geoscience (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41561-022-00947-w. www.nature.com/articles/s41561-022-00947-w

Journal information: Nature Geoscience 

Provided by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution 

Study of North Pacific 'garbage patch' shows abundance of neuston organisms

Credit: Cosimosal.b, CC BY-SA 4.0

A team of researchers from the U.K. and the U.S. has found that in addition to human garbage, the North Pacific "garbage patch" also has an abundance of neuston organisms. In their paper posted on the bioRxiv site, the group describes their study of material in the patch of sea and what sorts of creatures they found living in it.

Prior research has shown that there is an abundance of neuston in the Subtropical North Atlantic Gyre, which forms the Sargasso Sea—parts of which have been labeled the North Atlantic garbage patch, due to the huge amounts of human garbage that has accumulated there. Neuston is a term that has been coined to refer to floating lifeforms on the sea surface, and a gyre is a spiral or vortex, where water turns like clouds in a hurricane only much more slowly. Because the spinning is in the form of a vortex, material at the outer edge is pulled toward the center, which is why neuston and garbage tend to coalesce in them. In this new effort, the researchers wondered if there were similar numbers of neuston in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, which has over time come to be called the North Pacific garbage patch (NPGP) due to the large amount of human garbage floating in its center.

The work by the team was called the Vortex Swim—a sailing expedition in the NPGP that lasted for 80 days. The route taken by the I Am Ocean sailing vessel, was plotted using a numerical drift model—the team wanted to see what sorts of creatures were living among the densest parts of the garbage in the patch. As the ship sailed, a trawling device was dragged along behind to capture living creatures. The team also attached a General Oceanics Mechanical Flowmeter to the trawl to measure the volume of water in which the specimens were found.

In all the team collected 22 samples, 12 from inside the central gyre and 10 from outside, for comparison purposes. Specimens in the samples were identified and counted as were garbage samples. In studying the samples, the researchers found that as with the Atlantic Gyre, large numbers of neuston in the NPGP were concentrated near its center. They also found that concentrations of neuston were in the same proportions as the garbageHow does plastic debris make its way into ocean garbage patches?

More information: Fiona Chong et al, High Concentrations of floating life in the North Pacific Garbage Patch, bioRxiv (2022). DOI: 10.1101/2022.04.26.489631

© 2022 Science X Network

More reptile species may be at risk of extinction than previously thought

Machine learning tool estimates extinction risk for species previously unprioritized for conservation

Peer-Reviewed Publication

PLOS

 

IMAGE: POTAMITES MONTANICOLA, CLASSIFIED AS ‘CRITICALLY ENDANGERED’ BY AUTOMATED THE ASSESSMENT METHOD AND AS ‘DATA DEFICIENT’ BY THE IUCN RED LIST OF THREATENED SPECIES. view more 

CREDIT: GERMÁN CHÁVEZ, WIKIMEDIA COMMONS (CC-BY 3.0, HTTPS://CREATIVECOMMONS.ORG/LICENSES/BY/3.0)

The iconic Red List of Threatened Species, published by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), identifies species at risk of extinction. A study in PLOS Biology publishing May 26th by Gabriel Henrique de Oliveira Caetano at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel, and colleagues present a novel machine learning tool for assessing extinction risk, and then use this tool to show that reptile species which are unlisted due to lack of assessment or data are more likely to be threatened than assessed species.

The IUCN’s Red List of Threatened Species is the most comprehensive assessment of the extinction risk of species and informs conservation policy and practices globally. However, the process for categorizing species is laborious and subject to bias, depending heavily on manual curation by human experts; many animal species have therefore not been evaluated, or lack sufficient data, creating gaps in protective measures.

To assess 4,369 reptile species that were previously unable to be prioritized for conservation and develop accurate methods for assessing the extinction risk of obscure species, these researchers created a machine learning computer model. The model assigned IUCN extinction risk categories to the 40% of the world’s reptiles that lacked published assessments or are classified as “DD” (“Data Deficient”) at the time of the study. The researchers validated the model’s accuracy, comparing it to the Red List risk categorizations.

The researchers found that the number of threatened species is much higher than reflected in the IUCN Red List and that both unassessed (“Not Evaluated” or “NE”) and Data Deficient reptiles were more likely to be threatened than assessed species. Future studies are needed to better understand the specific factors underlying extinction risk in threatened reptile taxa, to obtain better data on obscure reptile taxa, and to create conservation plans that include newly identified, threatened species.

According to the authors, “Altogether, our models predict that the state of reptile conservation is far worse than currently estimated, and that immediate action is necessary to avoid the disappearance of reptile biodiversity. Regions and taxa we identified as likely to be more threatened should be given increased attention in new assessments and conservation planning. Lastly, the method we present here can be easily implemented to help bridge the assessment gap on other less known taxa”.

Coauthor Shai Meiri adds, “Importantly, the additional reptile species identified as threatened by our models are not distributed randomly across the globe or the reptilian evolutionary tree. Our added information highlights that there are more reptile species in peril – especially in Australia, Madagascar, and the Amazon basin – all of which have a high diversity of reptiles and should be targeted for extra conservation effort. Moreover, species rich groups, such as geckos and elapids (cobras, mambas, coral snakes, and others), are probably more threatened than the Global Reptile Assessment currently highlights, these groups should also be the focus of more conservation attention”

Coauthor Uri Roll adds, “Our work could be very important in helping the global efforts to prioritize the conservation of species at risk – for example using the IUCN red-list mechanism. Our world is facing a biodiversity crisis, and severe man-made changes to ecosystems and species, yet funds allocated for conservation are very limited. Consequently, it is key that we use these limited funds where they could provide the most benefits. Advanced tools- such as those we have employed here, together with accumulating data, could greatly cut the time and cost needed to assess extinction risk, and thus pave the way for more informed conservation decision making.”

#####

In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Biology:   http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3001544

Citation: Caetano GHdO, Chapple DG, Grenyer R, Raz T, Rosenblatt J, Tingley R, et al. (2022) Automated assessment reveals that the extinction risk of reptiles is widely underestimated across space and phylogeny. PLoS Biol 20(5): e3001544. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3001544

Author Countries: Israel, Australia, United Kingdom, United States of America

Funding: This work has been funded by the Israel Science Foundation grant Num. 406/19 to SM & UR (https://www.isf.org.il/). This work has been funded by the German-Israeli Foundation for Scientific Research and Development Num. I-2519-119.4/2019 to UR (https://www.gif.org.il/). It has also been partially funded by Australian Research Council grant num. FT200100108 to DGC (https://www.arc.gov.au/). We also thank the Australian Friends of Tel Aviv University–Monash University (‘AFTAM’) Academic Collaborative Awards Program for funding this research to SM & DGC. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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JOURNAL

PLoS Biology

DOI

10.1371/journal.pbio.3001544 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Computational simulation/modeling

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

COI STATEMENT

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

COLLECTIVISM IN ACTION

Professional ‘guilds’ of bacteria gave rise to the modern microbiome

Even the smallest marine invertebrates—some barely larger than single-celled protists—are home to distinct and diverse microbial communities, or microbiomes, according to new research from University of British Columbia (UBC) biologists.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

 

IMAGE: UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA EVOLUTIONARY MICROBIOLOGISTS COLLECTING MARINE INVERTEBRATE SAMPLES OFF CALVERT ISLAND, BRITISH COLUMBIA, CANADA. CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA. view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA.

Even the smallest marine invertebrates—some barely larger than single-celled protists—are home to distinct and diverse microbial communities, or microbiomes, according to new research from University of British Columbia (UBC) biologists.

The study underscores that a vast diversity of animals have microbiomes, just as humans do. But more surprisingly, there’s little correlation between how closely related most animals are and how similar their microbiomes are—something widely assumed to be true based on the study of humans, larger mammals, and insects.

“This says a lot about how microbiomes originated and how they evolve today,” says UBC evolutionary microbiologist Dr. Patrick Keeling, senior author of the paper published today in Nature Microbiology.

"People might intuitively think the purpose of a microbiome is to be of benefit to the host animal, and that they co-evolve together. But the bacteria could care less about helping the animal host—they have their own agenda.”

“Most animals harbour a community of bacteria that are simply good at living in animals. From this ‘professional guild’ of animal specialists likely evolved the more elaborate, co-evolving microbiomes that are well studied in humans and insects. But as we looked at a broader set of smaller marine animals, it became clear that the microbiomes of bigger creatures are likely exceptions, not the rule.”

The team found the microbiomes of the tiny creatures differ from the microbes living in the surrounding environment, and often differed from the microbiome of even closely related invertebrates.

Digging into the microbiomes of marine invertebrates

In what might be the broadest study of its kind, Dr. Keeling and colleagues sequenced the microbiomes from 1,037 animals from 21 phyla – covering most animals. Some of the lineages of animals sampled more broadly included Annelida (ringed worms), Arthropoda (the largest phylum in the animal kingdom) and Nematoda (a phylum of unsegmented, cylindrical worms). The researchers also collected samples from the surrounding habitats in British Columbia, Canada and Curaçao, a Dutch Caribbean island.

“Studying such a broad range of animals was crucial–in a smaller study a number of prevalent bacteria may have been mistaken for host-specific symbionts,” says Dr. Corey Holt, a postdoctoral fellow at UBC and one of the study’s first authors.

“We found most bacteria were only present in some individuals of a species, and most of these were also present other host species in the same environment.”

Exploring evolutionary time scales

“This survey was designed to look at an incredibly broad diversity of animals,” says Dr. Keeling. “The next step is to take a few of the more interesting groups and dig deeper to see how microbiomes evolved within that group to clarify the time scales at which different evolutionary processes are operating.”

The international team included researchers from UBC, the Hakai Institute, the University of Copenhagen, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, the Polish Academy of Sciences, the Swedish Museum of Natural History, and the University of Hamburg.

The work was funded by the Tula Foundation’s Hakai Institute, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, and the Canadian Graduate Scholarship programme.

CAPTION

New research from UBC indicates that creatures big and small—some barely larger than single-celled protists—are home to distinct and diverse microbial communities. A juvenile nudibranch (Mollusca) from macroalgae in Quadra Island, British Columbia, Canada. Credit: Niels Van Steenkiste, University of British Columbia.

CREDIT

Credit: Niels Van Steenkiste, University of British Columbia.

CAPTION

New research from UBC indicates that creatures big and small—some barely larger than single-celled protists—are home to distinct and diverse microbial communities. A sediment-dwelling hesionid (Annelida) from Quadra Island, British Columbia, Canada. Credit: Maria Herranz, University of British Columbia.

CREDIT

Credit: Maria Herranz, University of British Columbia.

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JOURNAL

Nature Microbiology

DOI

10.1038/s41564-022-01125-9 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Experimental study

ARTICLE TITLE

Microbiomes of microscopic marine invertebrates do not reveal signatures of phylosymbiosis

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

26-May-2022

New type of extremely reactive substance in the atmosphere

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN - FACULTY OF SCIENCE

 

IMAGE: REACTION: ROO + OH → ROOOH (OXYGEN ATOMS IN RED) view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN

For the first time, an entirely new class of super-reactive chemical compounds has been discovered under atmospheric conditions. Researchers from the University of Copenhagen, in close collaboration with international colleagues, have documented the formation of so-called trioxides – an extremely oxidizing chemical compound that likely affects both human health and our global climate.

A commonly known chemical compound is hydrogen peroxide. All peroxides have two oxygen atoms attached to each other, making them highly reactive and often flammable and explosive. They are used for everything from whitening teeth and hair, to cleaning wounds and even as rocket fuel. But peroxides are also found in the air surrounding us.

In recent years, there has been speculation as to whether trioxides – chemical compounds with three oxygen atoms attached to each other, and thereby even more reactive than the peroxides – are found in the atmosphere as well. But until now, it has never been unequivocally proven.

"This is what we have now accomplished," says Professor Henrik Grum Kjærgaard, at the University of Copenhagen’s Department of Chemistry. Kjærgaard is the senior author of the study, just published in the prestigious journal, Science.

He continues:

"The type of compounds we discovered are unique in their structure. And, because they are extremely oxidizing, they most likely bring a host of effects that we have yet to uncover."

Hydrotrioxides (ROOOH), as they are known, are a completely new class of chemical compounds.  Researchers at the University of Copenhagen (UCPH), together with colleagues at the Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research (TROPOS) and the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), have demonstrated that these compounds are formed under atmospheric conditions.

The researchers have also shown that hydrotrioxides are formed during the atmospheric decomposition of several known and widely emitted substances, including isoprene and dimethyl sulfide.

"It’s quite significant that we can now show, through direct observation, that these compounds actually form in the atmosphere, that they are surprisingly stable and that they are formed from almost all chemical compounds. All speculation must now be put to rest," says Jing Chen, a PhD student at the Department of Chemistry and second author of the study.

Hydrotrioxides are formed in a reaction between two types of radicals (see fact box). The researchers expect that almost all chemical compounds will form hydrotrioxides in the atmosphere and estimate that their lifespans range from minutes to hours. This makes them stable enough to react with many other atmospheric compounds. 

Presumably absorbed into aerosols

The research team also has the trioxides under strong suspicion of being able to penetrate into tiny airborne particles, known as aerosols, which pose a health hazard and can lead to respiratory and cardiovascular diseases.

"They will most likely enter aerosols, where they will form new compounds with new effects. It is easy to imagine that new substances are formed in the aerosols that are harmful if inhaled. But further investigation is required to address these potential health effects," says Henrik Grum Kjærgaard.

While aerosols also have an impact on climate, they are one of the things that are most difficult to describe in climate models. And according to the researchers, there is a high probability that hydrotrioxides impact how many aerosols are produced.

"As sunlight is both reflected and absorbed by aerosols, this affects the Earth's heat balance – that is, the ratio of sunlight that Earth absorbs and sends back into space. When aerosols absorb substances, they grow and contribute to cloud formation, which affects Earth's climate as well," says co-author and PhD. student, Eva R. Kjærgaard.

Compound’s effect needs to be studied further

The researchers hope that the discovery of hydrotrioxides will help us learn more about the effect of the chemicals we emit. 

"Most human activity leads to emission of chemical substances into the atmosphere. So, knowledge of the reactions that determine atmospheric chemistry is important if we are to be able to predict how our actions will affect the atmosphere in the future," says co-author and postdoc, Kristan H. Møller.

However, neither he nor Henrik Grum Kjærgaard are worried about the new discovery:

"These compounds have always been around – we just didn't know about them. But the fact that we now have evidence that the compounds are formed and live for a certain amount of time means that it is possible to study their effect more targeted and respond if they turn out to be dangerous," says Henrik Grum Kjærgaard.

"The discovery suggests that there could be plenty of other things in the air that we don't yet know about. Indeed, the air surrounding us is a huge tangle of complex chemical reactions. As researchers, we need to keep an open mind if we want to get better at finding solutions," concludes Jing Chen.

 

[FACT BOX] HOW HYDROTRIOXIDES ARE FORMED

When chemical compounds are oxidized in the atmosphere, they often react with OH radicals, typically forming a new radical. When this radical reacts with oxygen, it forms a third radical called peroxide (ROO), which in turn can react with the OH radical, thereby forming hydrotrioxides (ROOOH).

Reaction: ROO + OH → ROOOH

 

[FACT BOX] JUST HOW MUCH

• Isoprene is one of the most frequently emitted organic compounds into the atmosphere. The study shows that approximately 1% of all isoprene released turns into hydrotrioxides.
   
• The researchers estimate that the concentrations of ROOOH in the atmosphere are approximately 10 million per cm3. In comparison, OH radicals one of the most important oxidants in the atmosphere, are found in about 1 million radicals per cm3.
   

[FACT BOX] ABOUT THE STUDY

• The discovery of hydrotrioxides is described in a research article just published in the renowned journal, Science.
   
• While the theories behind the new research results were developed in Copenhagen, the experiments were conducted using mass spectrometry, partly at the Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research (TROPOS) in Germany, and partly at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in the United States.
   
• While higher concentrations must be used in many experiments, these experiments are performed in an environment that is nearly identical to the atmosphere, which makes the results very reliable and comparable to the atmosphere. Measuring the hydrotrioxides was made possible by using incredibly sensitive measuring instruments.
   
• The study was conducted by: Torsten Berndt, Andreas Tilgner, Erik H. Hoffmann and Hartmut Hermann of the Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research (TROPOS); Jing Chen, Eva R. Kjærgaard, Kristian H. Møller and Henrik Grum Kjærgaard at the University of Copenhagen’s Department of Chemistry; and John D. Crounse and Paul O. Wennberg at Caltech.

 

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JOURNAL

Science

DOI

10.1126/science.abn6012 

ARTICLE TITLE

Hydrotrioxide (ROOOH) formation in the atmosphere

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

26-May-2022

A quarter of the world's Internet users rely on infrastructure that is susceptible to attacks

Reports and Proceedings

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - SAN DIEGO

 

IMAGE: FRACTION OF EACH COUNTRY'S IP ADDRESSES THAT ARE EXPOSED TO OBSERVATION OR SELECTIVE TAMPERING BY COMPANIES THAT CONNECT INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDERS TO THE GLOBAL INTERNET. COUNTRIES ARE SHADED IN PROGRESSIVE SHADES OF BLUE, WITH WOST EXPOSED COUNTRIES IN THE DARKEST BLUE. COUNTRIES IN GRAY EXCLUDED FROM THE STUDY. view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO

About a quarter of the world’s Internet users live in countries that are more susceptible than previously thought to targeted attacks on their Internet infrastructure. Many of the at-risk countries are located in the Global South. 

That’s the conclusion of a sweeping, large-scale study conducted by computer scientists at the University of California San Diego. The researchers surveyed 75 countries. 

“We wanted to study the topology of the Internet to find weak links that, if compromised, would expose an entire nation’s traffic,” said Alexander Gamero-Garrido, the paper’s first author, who earned his Ph.D. in computer science at UC San Diego. 

Researchers presented their findings at the Passive and Active Measurement Conference 2022 online this spring.

The structure of the Internet can differ dramatically in different parts of the world. In many developed countries, like the United States, a large number of Internet providers compete to provide services for a large number of users. These networks are directly connected to one another and exchange content, a process known as direct peering. All the providers can also plug directly into the world’s Internet infrastructure.

“But a large portion of the Internet doesn’t function with peering agreements for network connectivity,” Gamero-Garrido pointed out. 

In other nations, many of them still developing countries, most users rely on a handful of providers for Internet access, and one of these providers serves an overwhelming majority of users. Not only that, but those providers rely on a limited number of companies called transit autonomous systems to get access to the global Internet and traffic from other countries. Researchers found that often these transit autonomous system providers are state owned. 

This, of course, makes countries with this type of Internet infrastructure particularly vulnerable to attacks because all that is needed is to cripple a small number of transit autonomous systems. These countries, of course, are also vulnerable if a main Internet provider experiences outages. 

In the worst case scenario, one transit autonomous system serves all users. Cuba and Sierra Leone are close to this state of affairs. By contrast, Bangladesh went from only two to over 30 system providers, after the government opened that sector of the economy to private enterprise. 

This underlines the importance of government regulation when it comes to the number of Internet providers and transit autonomous systems available in a country. For example, researchers were surprised to find that many operators of submarine Internet cables are state-owned rather than privately operated.

Researchers also found traces of colonialism in the topology of the Internet in the Global South. For example, French company Orange has a strong presence in some African countries. 

Researchers relied on Border Gateway Protocol data, which tracks exchanges of routing and reachability information among autonomous systems on the Internet. They are aware that the data can be incomplete, introducing potential inaccuracies, though these are mitigated by the study’s methodology and validation with real, in-country Internet operators. 

Next steps include looking at how critical facilities, such as hospitals, are connected to the Internet and how vulnerable they are. 

Quantifying Nations’ Exposure to Traffic Observation and Selective Tampering (PDF)

 Alberto Dainotti (now at Georgia Institute of Technology),  Alexander Gamero-Garrido (now at Northeastern University), Bradley Huffaker and Alex C. Snoeren, University of California San Diego Esteban Carisimo, Northwestern University 
Shuai Hao, Old Dominion University 

 

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METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Quantifying nations’ exposure to traffic observation and selective tampering

Scientists Want To Open 830-Million-Year-Old Crystal With Potential Life Inside

IS ANYBODY THERE? FLUID INCLUSIONS IN A SAMPLE OF HALITE, POTENTIALLY CONTAINING ANCIENT MICROORGANISMS. IMAGE CREDIT: SARA SCHREDER-GOMES

By Tom Hale

26 MAY 2022, 14:45

Scientists recently announced the tantalizing discovery of ancient prokaryotic and algal cells – which may potentially still be alive – inside an 830-million-year-old rock salt crystal. Now, the researchers have spoken a little bit more about their recent study and suggested they have plans to crack open the crystal in the hope of revealing whether this ancient life is truly still alive.

Initially reported in the journal Geology earlier this month, the team used a selection of imaging techniques to discover well-preserved organic solids locked within fluid inclusions embedded in an 830-million-year-old piece of rock salt, also known as halite. They argue that these objects bear an uncanny resemblance to cells of prokaryotes and algae.

Crystalized rock salt is not capable of sustaining ancient life by itself, so the potential microorganisms are not simply locked within the crystals, like an ant trapped in amber. As rock salt crystals form through the evaporation of salty seawater, they can trap small amounts of water and microscopic organisms in primary fluid inclusions.

A video of this incredible crystal can be seen below. Notice how a bubble can be seen within the crystal as the researcher gently moves it around – it's within this small fluid-filled cavity they found the potential hints of life. 

Since previous work has indicated that microscopic life can perhaps survive in a dormant state within the fluid inclusions of salt crystals for hundreds of millions of year, the team are keen to find out whether these tiny cells might still be alive.

Speaking to NPR, study author Kathy Benison, a geologist from the West Virginia University, said they aim to open up the crystal to confirm whether these organic objects truly are still alive or whether they have perished. 

"There are little cubes of the original liquid from which that salt grew. And the surprise for us is that we also saw shapes that are consistent with what we would expect from microorganisms. And they could be still surviving within that 830-million-year-old preserved microhabitat," Benison told NPR. 

While bringing 830-million-year-old life forms back into the modern world might not sound like the most apocalypse-proof plan, she’s confident it will be carried out with the utmost caution.

"It does sound like a really bad B-movie, but there is a lot of detailed work that's been going on for years to try to figure out how to do that in the safest possible way," Benison added.

Other scientists agreed with Benison that, if carried out cautiously and correctly, the feat should not be a concern. After all, an organism that is hundreds of years of millions of years older than humans is unlikely to be well-adapted to infect us or bring harm. 

"An environmental organism that has never seen a human is not going to have the mechanism to get inside of us and cause disease. So I personally, from a science perspective, have no fear of that," commented Bonnie Baxter, a biologist at Westminster College in Salt Lake City, who was not involved in the study.

UH OH

New data reveals climate change might be more rapid than predicted

by Weizmann Institute of Science

Winter storms in the Southern Hemisphere. Credit: NASA Worldview

About 30 massive, intricate computer networks serve the scientists who stand at the forefront of climate change research. Each network runs a software program comprised of millions of lines of code. These programs are computational models that combine the myriads of physical, chemical and biological phenomena that together form the climate of our planet. The models calculate the state of Earth's atmosphere, oceans, land and ice, capturing past and present climate variability and using the data to predict future climate change. These results are analyzed by leading research institutes across the globe, including the Weizmann Institute of Science, and then incorporated into the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment report. Policymakers rely on the IPCC report when they form adaptation and mitigation strategies for climate change, one of our generation's greatest crises.

A new study, published today in Nature Climate Change, will certainly make the IPCC—and other environmental bodies—take notice. A team of scientists led by Dr. Rei Chemke of Weizmann's Earth and Planetary Sciences Department revealed a considerable intensification of winter storms in the Southern Hemisphere. The study, conducted in collaboration with Dr. Yi Ming of Princeton University and Dr. Janni Yuval of MIT, is sure to make waves in the climate conversation. Until now, climate models have projected a human-caused intensification of winter storms only toward the end of this century. In the new study, Chemke and his team compared climate model simulations with current storm observations. Their discovery was bleak: It became clear that storm intensification over recent decades has already reached levels projected to occur in the year 2080.

"A winter storm is a weather phenomenon that lasts only a few days. Individually, each storm doesn't carry much climatic weight. However, the long-term effect of winter storms becomes evident when assessing cumulative data collected over long periods of time," Chemke explains. Cumulatively, these storms have a significant impact, affecting the transfer of heat, moisture and momentum within the atmosphere, which consequently affects the various climate zones on Earth. "One example of this is the role the storms play in regulating the temperature at the Earth's poles. Winter storms are responsible for the majority of the heat transport away from tropical regions toward the poles. Without their contribution, the average pole temperatures would be about 30°C lower." Similarly, the collective intensification of these storms yields a real and significant threat to societies in the Southern Hemisphere in the next decades.

"We chose to focus on the Southern Hemisphere because the intensification registered there has been stronger than in the Northern Hemisphere," Chemke says. "We didn't examine the Northern Hemisphere, but it seems that the intensification of storms in this hemisphere is slower compared to that in the Southern Hemisphere. If the trend persists," Chemke adds, "we will be observing more significant winter storm intensification here in the upcoming years and decades."

In his lab at the Weizmann Institute, Chemke researches the physical mechanisms underlying large-scale climate change. In this study, he and his research partners sought to understand whether these changes in climate patterns were caused by external factors (such as human activity), or whether they have resulted from the internal fluctuations of the global climate system. They analyzed climate models that simulated storm intensification patterns under the isolated influence of internal climatic causes, without external impact. They showed that over the past 20 years, storms have been intensifying faster than can be explained by internal climatic behavior alone.

In addition, the researchers discovered the physical process behind the storm intensification. An analysis of the growth rate of the storms showed that changes in atmospheric jet streams over the past few decades have caused these escalations, and current climate models are unable to reflect these changes accurately.

Chemke, Ming and Yuval's study has two immediate, considerable implications. First, it shows that not only climate projections for the coming decades are graver than previous assessments, but it also suggests that human activity might have a greater impact on the Southern Hemisphere than previously estimated. This means that rapid and decisive intervention is required in order to halt the climate damage in this region. Second, a correction of the bias in climate models is in order, so that these can provide a more accurate climate projection in the future.

Could the climate models be inaccurately predicting other important phenomena? "The models are doing a very good job at forecasting nearly all the parameters," Chemke says. "We've discovered one parameter for which the sensitivity of the models needs to be adjusted. Changes in temperature, precipitation, sea ice, and summer storm patterns, for example, are all being simulated accurately."

The study's findings are expected to help climate researchers around the world correct the bias in the models and create a more accurate prediction of future climate patterns. In addition, the updated understanding of the intensification of winter storms over the past several decades will help us gain a better understanding of the state of the Earth's climate. Climate scientists will now be able to estimate more accurately the extent of the damage that climate change is expected to wreak—damage that will only be mitigated if humanity intervenes and takes responsibility for the future of the planet.Jet stream that brought storm Eunice has been getting faster over last century

More information: Rei Chemke, The intensification of winter mid-latitude storm tracks in the Southern Hemisphere, Nature Climate Change (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41558-022-01368-8. www.nature.com/articles/s41558-022-01368-8

Journal information: Nature Climate Change 

Provided by Weizmann Institute of Science