Mariana Trench Full Of Microbial Life, Expedition Finds
Deep-Sea Collector The autonomous instrument used to collect oxygen data from the bottom of the Mariana Trench Anni GludA look around one of the darkest neighborhoods on Earth The bottomest bottom of the ocean, nearly 11,000 meters (6.8 miles) down, is actually full of microbial life, a new study found. An international team of marine scientists sent an autonomous instrument down to measure oxygen at the bottom of the Mariana Trench in the central western Pacific. The Mariana is the deepest known ocean trench. The researchers found unusually high rates of oxygen consumption, a sign of microbe metabolism. (Living microbes, like people, take in oxygen.) The finding is surprising because it's hard to get enough food down so far. All bottom-dwellers depend on food that drifts down from the shallower parts of the sea. Only 1 or 2 percent of the organic stuff from the surface is supposed to make its way...