01.09.2006: 01.09.2006: An Underwater Lake of Liqu

An Underwater Lake of Liquid Carbon Dioxide
Japanese - German Marine Scientists Discover Strange Ecosystem in 1300 meter depth off the East Coast of Taiwan


As carbon dioxide, one of the greenhouse gases, continues to build-up in the atmosphere, it will lead to the negative effect of Earth’s climate change. To reduce levels of CO2 emissions in the atmosphere, one proposed method is to bury the CO2 by injecting it into the deep ocean; however, the environmental impact on ocean ecosystems is unknown. Dr. Fumio Inagaki, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), and his colleagues of Max-Planck-Institute for Marine Microbiology studied a natural deep-sea CO2 lake in the southern Okinawa Trough, off Taiwan. By using a manned submersible “Shinkai 6500”, the researchers observed a sediment-hosted CO2 lake near the active hydrothermal vent at 1380 meters below the sea surface. The liquid CO2 was trapped in the overlying surface sediment that contained hydrates and high concentration of elemental sulfur. They analyzed the diversity of microbial community in sediment samples and their potential carbon sources by DNA and lipid biomarkers. The results showed that although the cell abundance in liquid CO2/CO2 hydrate interface decreases two orders of magnitude lower than that in the seafloor, one-carbon utilizing chemolithotrophic microbial community were indeed present in the sediments (i.e., anaerobic oxidation of methane [AOM], sulfur-metabolizing chemolithoautotrophs). The results expand out knowledge of extreme microbial habitats and, as the first natural analogue, may give new insights into the issues of deep-sea CO2 disposal and of extraterrestrial life.

Reference
Fumio Inagaki, Marcel M. M. Kuypers, Urumu Tsunogai, Jun-ichiro Ishibai, Ko-ichi Nakamura, Tina Treude, Satoru Ohkubo, Miwako Nakaseama, Kaul Gena, Hitoshi Chiba, Hisako Hirayama, Takuro Nunoura, Ken Takai, Bo B. Jørgensen, Koki Horikoshi, and Antje Boetius. Microbial community in a sediment-hosted CO2 lake of the southern Okinawa Trough hydrothermal system. Proc. Natl, Acad. Sci. USA, August 2006.

The article is scheduled for the September 19 print issue.
(Online version 19 September 2006: http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.0606083103)

Requests:

Dr. Fumio Inagaki
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Subground Animalcule Retrieval (SUGAR) Program, Extremobiosphere Research Center, Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology
(JAMSTEC), Yokosuka 237-0061, Japan;
Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen 28359, Germany;

Dr. Marcel Kuypers
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Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen 28359, Germany;


Prof. Dr. Antje Boetius
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Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen 28359, Germany;

Prof. Dr. Bo Barker Jørgensen  
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Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen 28359, Germany;


Dr. Manfred Schloesser (Press Officer)
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Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, Bremen 28359, Germany;