A groundbreaking discovery of extreme habitats has the potential to address three enigmas at once: offering new insights into the formation of Earth’s oceans, uncovering secrets about extraterrestrial life, and revealing compounds that could be effective in fighting cancer. This achievement is credited to a team of researchers at the University of Miami, who identified vast brine pools in the Red Sea capable of swiftly incapacitating or killing any organism that ventures into them, as reported initially by Live Science.
Although life does exist on the periphery of these perilous aquatic zones, creatures unfortunate enough to descend into their depths do not survive and instead undergo a pickling process. Nonetheless, these rare brine pools may hold vital clues about climatic changes spanning millennia in the region and could even illuminate the origins of life on Earth, as outlined in a study published in the journal Nature Communications Earth and Environment.
Unveiling the mysteries of deep-sea brine pools, it’s important to note that these are highly saline lakes forming on the ocean floor, representing some of the planet’s most extreme environments due to their lack of oxygen and lethal salinity levels. Renowned for hosting extremophile microbes, they offer insights into the beginnings of life on Earth and the potential evolution of life on water-rich celestial bodies.
While deep-sea brine pools were previously known to exist in the Gulf of Mexico, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Red Sea, this study challenges previous assumptions. Scientists discovered the first such pools in the Gulf of Aqaba, a northern enclave of the Red Sea, located within 1.25 miles (2 km) from the shore, in contrast to the previous belief that all Red Sea deep-sea pools were at least 15.5 miles (25 km) offshore.
The brine pools, named NEOM, were found 1.1 miles (1.77 km) beneath the surface of the Red Sea during a 2020 expedition using a remotely operated underwater vehicle onboard the OceanXplorer research vessel. Sam Purkis, the lead author and professor at the University of Miami, explained that despite the ordinarily limited life on the seabed at such depths, the brine pools are thriving oases of life with dense microbial carpets supporting a diverse array of animals.
In addition to their scientific significance, these pools near the coast may have received runoff from the land, incorporating terrestrial materials into their chemical composition. This makes them potential archives of historical tsunamis, floods, and earthquakes over thousands of years.
Purkis highlighted that core samples from the newly discovered brine pools provide an uninterrupted record of past rainfall, spanning over 1,000 years, along with records of earthquakes and tsunamis. This information could reshape our understanding of the frequency of large floods and tsunamis in the region, influencing the ongoing construction of massive infrastructure projects along the coastline.
The implications of this discovery extend beyond Earth, offering possibilities for microbial findings that could contribute to the development of innovative medicines and treatments. Deep-sea microorganisms from brine pools have previously yielded molecules with antibacterial and anticancer effects. On a cosmic scale, the brine pools could also serve as a key to unraveling the mysteries of extraterrestrial life.
Purkis emphasized that the deep-sea brine pools are excellent analogs for the early Earth, where life likely originated in anoxic (without oxygen) conditions. Despite their lack of oxygen and extreme salinity, these pools are home to a thriving community of extremophile microbes. Studying this microbial community provides insights into the conditions where life first emerged on our planet and may guide the search for life on other water-rich worlds within our solar system and beyond.
