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(Top) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Coordinates: 77°43′S 162°16′E

Geochemistry
Blood Falls is an outflow of an iron oxide–tainted plume of saltwater, flowing from the tongue of Taylor
Microbial ecosystem
Glacier onto the ice-covered surface of West Lake Bonney in the Taylor Valley of the McMurdo Dry Valleys
Implications for the Snowball Earth
in Victoria Land, East Antarctica.
hypothesis
Implications for astrobiology Iron-rich hypersaline water sporadically emerges from small fissures in the ice cascades. The saltwater
source is a subglacial pool of unknown size overlain by about 400 metres (1,300 ft) of ice several kilometers
See also
from its tiny outlet at Blood Falls.
References Blood Falls, 2006
The reddish deposit was found in 1911 by the Australian geologist Thomas Griffith Taylor, who first explored
Further reading the valley that bears his name.[1] The Antarctica pioneers first attributed the red color to red algae, but later
External links it was proven to be due to iron oxides.

Geochemistry [ edit ]

Poorly soluble hydrous ferric oxides are deposited at the surface of ice after the ferrous ions present in the
unfrozen saltwater are oxidized in contact with atmospheric oxygen. The more soluble ferrous ions initially
are dissolved in old seawater trapped in an ancient pocket remaining from the Antarctic Ocean when a fjord
was isolated by the glacier in its progression during the Miocene period, some 5 million years ago, when the Blood Falls, at the toe of Taylor
sea level was higher than today. Glacier, 2013

Unlike most Antarctic glaciers, the Taylor Glacier is not frozen to the bedrock, probably because of the
presence of salts concentrated by the crystallization of the ancient seawater imprisoned below it. Salt cryo-concentration occurred in the deep relict
seawater when pure ice crystallized and expelled its dissolved salts as it cooled down because of the heat exchange of the captive liquid seawater
with the enormous ice mass of the glacier. As a consequence, the trapped seawater was concentrated in brines with a salinity two to three times that
of the mean ocean water. A second mechanism sometimes also explaining the formation of hypersaline brines is the water evaporation of surface
lakes directly exposed to the very dry polar atmosphere in the McMurdo Dry Valleys. The analyses of stable isotopes of water allow, in principle, to
distinguish between both processes as long as there is no mixing between differently formed brines.[2]

Hypersaline fluid, sampled fortuitously through a crack in the ice, was oxygen-free and rich in sulfate and ferrous ion. Sulfate is a remnant
geochemical signature of marine conditions, while soluble divalent iron was likely liberated under reducing conditions from the subglacial bedrock
minerals weathered by microbial activity.

Microbial ecosystem [ edit ]

Chemical and microbial analyses both indicate that a rare subglacial ecosystem of autotrophic
bacteria developed that metabolizes sulfate and ferric ions.[3][4] According to geomicrobiologist
Jill Mikucki at the University of Tennessee, water samples from Blood Falls contained at least
17 different types of microbes, and almost no oxygen.[3] An explanation may be that the
microbes use sulfate to respire with ferric ions and metabolize the trace levels of organic
matter trapped with them. Such a metabolic process had never before been observed in
nature.[3]

A puzzling observation is the coexistence of ferrous and sulfate ions under anoxic conditions.
No sulfide anions are found in the system. This suggests an intricate and poorly understood
A schematic cross-section of Blood Falls showing
interaction between the sulfur and the iron biochemical cycles.
how subglacial microbial communities have survived
In December 2014, scientists and engineers led by Mikucki returned to Taylor Glacier and used in cold, darkness, and absence of oxygen for a million
years in brine water below Taylor Glacier.
a probe called IceMole, designed by a German collaboration, to melt into the glacier and
directly sample the salty water (brine) that feeds Blood Falls.[5]

Samples were analyzed, and revealed a cold (−7 °C (19 °F)), iron-rich (3.4 mM) subglacial brine (8% sodium chloride). From these samples,
scientists isolated and characterized a type of bacteria capable of growing in salty water (halophilic), that thrives in the cold (psychrophile), and is
heterotrophic, which they assigned to the genus Marinobacter.[6] DNA bioinformatic analysis indicated the presence of at least four gene clusters
involved in secondary metabolism. Two gene clusters are related to the production of aryl polyenes, which function as antioxidants that protect the
bacteria from reactive oxygen species.[6] Another gene cluster seems to be involved in terpene biosynthesis, most likely to produce pigments.[6]
Other bacteria identified are Thiomicrospira sp., and Desulfocapsa sp.

Implications for the Snowball Earth hypothesis [ edit ]

According to Mikucki et al. (2009), the now-inaccessible subglacial pool was sealed off 1.5 to 2 million years ago and transformed into a kind of
"time capsule", isolating the ancient microbial population for a sufficiently long time to evolve independently of other similar marine organisms. It
explains how other microorganisms could have survived when the Earth (according to the Snowball Earth hypothesis) was entirely frozen over.

Ice-covered oceans might have been the only refugium for microbial ecosystems when the Earth apparently was covered by glaciers at tropical
latitudes during the Proterozoic eon about 650 to 750 million years ago.

Implications for astrobiology [ edit ]

This unusual place offers scientists a unique opportunity to study deep subsurface microbial life in extreme conditions without the need to drill deep
boreholes in the polar ice cap, with the associated contamination risk of a fragile and still-intact environment.

The study of harsh environments on Earth is useful to understand the range of conditions to which life can adapt and to advance assessment of the
possibility of life elsewhere in the solar system, in places such as Mars or Europa, an ice-covered moon of Jupiter. Scientists of the NASA
Astrobiology Institute speculate that these worlds could contain subglacial liquid water environments favorable to hosting elementary forms of life,
which would be better protected at depth from ultraviolet and cosmic radiation than on the surface.[7][8]

See also [ edit ]

Extremophiles (organisms resistant to extreme conditions)

Psychrophile (bacteria resistant to cold)
Cryoconcentration of hypersaline brines
Eutectic system
Freezing-point depression
Life on Mars

References [ edit ]

1. ^ "Explanation offered for Antarctica's 'Blood Falls' " . ScienceDaily. Ohio State University. November 5, 2003. Retrieved April 18, 2009.
2. ^ Horita, Juske (February 2009). "Isotopic evolution of saline lakes in the low-latitude and polar regions" . Aquatic Geochemistry. 15 (1–2): 43–69.
doi:10.1007/s10498-008-9050-3 . S2CID 140535685 .
3. ^ a b c Grom, Jackie (April 16, 2009). "Ancient Ecosystem Discovered Beneath Antarctic Glacier" . Science. Retrieved April 17, 2009.
4. ^ Mikucki, Jill A.; et al. (April 17, 2009). "A Contemporary Microbially Maintained Subglacial Ferrous "Ocean" ". Science. 324 (5925): 397–400.
Bibcode:2009Sci...324..397M . doi:10.1126/science.1167350 . PMID 19372431 . S2CID 44802632 .
5. ^ Rejcek, Peter (March 4, 2015). "Lifeblood of a Glacier" . The Antarctic Sun. Retrieved March 4, 2015.
6. ^ a b c Carter, J.; et al. (December 2016). "Induction of cryptic metabolites from a rare Antarctic psychrophile, Marinobacter sp". Planta Medica. 82 (S 01).
P581. doi:10.1055/s-0036-1596642 . ISSN 0032-0943 .
7. ^ "Science Goal 1: Determine if Life Ever Arose On Mars" . Mars Exploration Program. NASA. Retrieved October 17, 2010.
8. ^ "The Case of the Missing Mars Water" . Science@NASA. NASA. January 5, 2001. Retrieved April 20, 2009.

Further reading [ edit ]

Lerman, Abraham (February 2009). "Saline Lakes' Response to Global Change". Aquatic Geochemistry. 15 (1–2): 1–5. doi:10.1007/s10498-008-
9058-8 . S2CID 129653802 .
Green, William J.; Lyons, W. Berry (February 2009). "The Saline Lakes of the McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica". Aquatic Geochemistry. 15 (1–2):
321–348. doi:10.1007/s10498-008-9052-1 . S2CID 128898063 .
Kluger, Jeffrey (April 18, 2009). "An Organism Survives Antarctica, and Maybe Mars" . Time.
Tierney, John (April 19, 2009). "The Dark Secret at Blood Falls" . The New York Times.
"Newly Discovered Iron-breathing Species Have Lived In Cold Isolation For Millions Of Years" . ScienceDaily. Harvard University. April 17,
2009.
Badgeley, Jessica A.; Pettit, Erin C.; Carr, Christina G.; et al. (24 April 2017). "An englacial hydrologic system of brine within a cold glacier: Blood
Falls, McMurdo Dry Valleys, Antarctica" . Journal of Glaciology. 63 (239): 387–400. Bibcode:2017JGlac..63..387B .
doi:10.1017/jog.2017.16 .

External links [ edit ]

Blood Falls, Antarctica's Dry Valleys by NASA Earth Observatory

Blood Falls - 100 Wonders on YouTube by Atlas Obscura

· · Extremophiles [hide]

Acidophile · Alkaliphile · Capnophile · Endolith · Halophile · Hypolith · Lipophile · Lithoautotroph · Lithophile · Methanogen · Metallotolerant ·
Types Oligotroph · Osmophile · Piezophile · Polyextremophile · Psammophile · Psychrophile · Radioresistant · Thermophile / Hyperthermophile ·
Thermoacidophile · Xerophile
Chloroflexus aurantiacus · Deinococcus radiodurans · Deinococcota · Snottite · Thermus aquaticus · Thermus thermophilus ·
Bacteria
Spirochaeta americana · GFAJ-1
Notable
extremophiles Archaea Pyrococcus furiosus · Strain 121 · Pyrolobus fumarii · Thermococcus gammatolerans

Eukaryota Cyanidioschyzon merolae · Galdieria sulphuraria · Paralvinella sulfincola · Halicephalobus mephisto · Pompeii worm

Abiogenic petroleum origin · Acidithiobacillales · Acidobacteriota · Acidophiles in acid mine drainage · Archaeoglobaceae · Berkeley Pit ·
Related articles Blood Falls · Thermoproteota · Grylloblattidae · Halobacteria · Halobacterium · Helaeomyia petrolei · Hydrothermal vent · Methanopyrus ·
Movile Cave · Radiotrophic fungus · Rio Tinto · Tardigrada · Taq polymerase · Thermostability · Thermotogota

Categories: Geomicrobiology Landforms of Victoria Land McMurdo Dry Valleys

This page was last edited on 15 June 2023, at 10:45 (UTC).

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