All posts tagged: seafloor

Ancient fossils suggest complex life got its start on an oxygenated seafloor

Ancient fossils suggest complex life got its start on an oxygenated seafloor

Published by Jenni Sidey

Early eukaryotes, the lineage that later gave rise to animals, plants and fungi, may have depended on oxygen from the start. However, they mostly stayed on the seafloor. That narrow habitat could help explain why complex life took so long to spread widely. The oldest widely accepted eukaryote fossils come from seas that were anything but inviting. Oxygen was scarce, the chemistry of the water shifted from place to place, and much of the ocean floor remained hostile to complex organisms. Yet in that patchwork world, a crucial branch of life appears to have found its footing. A study in Nature argues that some of the earliest known eukaryotes, organisms in the domain that later gave rise to animals, plants and fungi, were already tied to oxygen between about 1.75 billion and 1.4 billion years ago. Moreover, the fossils also point to a more grounded lifestyle than many scientists had assumed. These organisms seem to have lived on or within the seafloor, not drifting freely as plankton in the water above. That picture matters because …

The Download: seafloor science and military chatbots

The Download: seafloor science and military chatbots

Published by skeptic

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Inexpensive seafloor-hopping submersibles could stoke deep-sea science—and mining Last week, two oblong neon submersibles started to descend nearly 6,000 meters into the Pacific Ocean. Throughout the rest of May, they will map the seafloor in search of critical mineral deposits.  If all goes well, the vehicles, built by Orpheus Ocean, could help scientists probe the vastly understudied deep sea—and the resources it holds—at a fraction of the cost of existing systems. But the same submersibles are also attracting deep-sea mining companies, raising concerns about environmental impacts. Find out why they’re drawing so much attention. —Hannah Richter The new war room: 10 Things That Matter in AI Right Now  A new kind of system has entered the war room: conversational AI tools that commanders turn to not just for analysis, but for advice.  One US defense official told MIT Technology Review that personnel might give these advice engines a list of potential …

Researchers discover massive hydrogen system beneath the Pacific Ocean

Researchers discover massive hydrogen system beneath the Pacific Ocean

Published by Jenni Sidey

Far below the surface of the western Pacific Ocean, scientists have uncovered a geological system that reshapes how you may think about Earth’s hidden energy potential. Deep beneath thousands of meters of water, a massive network of ancient underground structures points to the presence of large amounts of natural hydrogen formed deep within the planet. Hydrogen is the most common element in the solar system and a promising clean fuel. Yet on Earth, large natural stores have been difficult to find. Most hydrogen used today is produced through industrial methods that rely on fossil fuels. This new discovery suggests the planet itself may generate far more hydrogen than once believed. Researchers from the Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, working with international collaborators, identified the system on the east Caroline Plate, west of the Mussau Trench. The team analyzed a vast group of underground formations that show clear signs of intense hydrogen driven activity in the distant past. The high-resolution bathymetry map of the whole studied region near the Mussau Trench by …

Could You Use a Rowboat to Walk on the Seafloor Like Jack Sparrow?

Could You Use a Rowboat to Walk on the Seafloor Like Jack Sparrow?

Published by skeptic

But you already know about this, because Fg is what normies call an object’s “weight,” and for a given volume, weight depends only on the density. Now, if you dropped these blocks in a lake, obviously the styrofoam would float and the steel would sink. So clearly it has something to do with density. What if you had a block of water with the same volume? If you could somehow hold this cube of water, it would feel pretty heavy, about 62.4 pounds. Now, if you place it carefully in a lake, will it sink or bob on the surface like styrofoam? Neither, right? It’s just going to sit there. Since it doesn’t move up or down, the total force on the block of water must be zero. That means there has to be a force counteracting gravity by pushing up with equal strength. We call this buoyancy, and for any object, the buoyancy force is equal to the weight of the water it displaces. So let’s think about this. The steel block displaces the …

The Scramble for the Seafloor | Rebecca Egan McCarthy

The Scramble for the Seafloor | Rebecca Egan McCarthy

Published by Jenni Sidey

Since 1779 photosynthesis has been the standard-issue explanation for the continuation of life on earth: plants absorb sunlight, which fuels their metabolism, and create oxygen as waste. This is such basic, grade-school science that it normally wouldn’t bear mentioning, but in July 2024 a team led by Andrew Sweetman at the Scottish Association for Marine Science reported a startling finding in Nature. On the deep seafloor—where light never penetrates—oxygen is apparently being produced by rocks. These rocks are known as polymetallic nodules, which form over the course of millions of years when small debris like sharks’ teeth attract trace metals from the surrounding seawater. The seafloor is covered in a viscous ooze, composed of the compressed skeletons of dead marine life, and the nodules lie strewn atop it, packed closely together. Sweetman and his team were investigating the microbial life in this deep-sea environment by lowering custom-designed chambers into the depths, creating a seal around seafloor sediment. Generally, the oxygen within the chambers decreases as various organisms consume it. In the nodule fields, against all …