Oxygen discovery defies knowledge of the deep ocean
Scientists find "dark oxygen" produced by metallic nodules in deep ocean, challenging photosynthesis as sole oxygen source. Mining these nodules for metals like lithium and cobalt may disrupt oxygen production, harming marine life and ecosystems. Researchers suggest potential similar processes on other planets.
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Scientists have discovered "dark oxygen" being produced in the deep ocean by metallic nodules on the seafloor, challenging the previous belief that oxygen is only produced through photosynthesis. These nodules act like batteries, splitting seawater into oxygen and hydrogen without the need for sunlight. Mining companies are interested in collecting these nodules for metals like lithium and cobalt, but this could disrupt the oxygen production process and harm marine life. The discovery raises concerns about the environmental risks of deep-sea mining ventures. The researchers suggest that similar processes could be happening on other planets, potentially creating oxygen-rich environments for life to thrive. However, marine scientists warn that deep-sea mining could lead to the destruction of ecosystems we still poorly understand. They advocate for further exploration and environmentally friendly mining practices in the deep ocean.
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16 commentsIf companies could find a way force you to pay for oxygen, every single one of us knows in our hearts that they would.
These scientific cruises are a huge undertaking, and the fact that the team managed to do this during Covid was an achievement by itself. Shipping containers filled with obscure tech to a different country that you'll then send to the bottom of the ocean will surely raise eyebrows at customs. Then there was the self-isolating, and working in shifts so different teams can do different kinds of lander deployments (and pick them back up), etc. Incredible!
Some of the tech that's put on these kinds of research ships is pretty crazy, too. For example, they put spherical glass floats on landers that go to the bottom of the ocean[0]. Weights pull the lander down, and when the lander receives a signal it detaches the weights[1] so the floats pull it back up. These glass floats are pretty big and need to be able to resist a huge amount of pressure at depths of multiple kilometers. If I recall correctly, if one of these spheres breaks, due to the pressure, the collapse of the water on all sides of the sphere results in as much energy released as an atomic bomb.
As to this research: the researchers initially weren't too happy to find this. First they doubted if it was correct, but it's actually worse when you find out it is in fact correct but it goes against everything in biology books: how the hell are you going to explain this to people?
[0] I'm not sure if a lander like that was used in this research btw, it's just an example that I found interesting.
[1] One time, I think on a different cruise, researchers didn't have enough weights to do an extra deployment, so they got weights from the gym on the ship and put them on the lander. There's a whole bunch of these kinds of interesting/funny stories in different fields of science, could be nice if someone were to collect them somewhere.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-024-01480-8
TLDR:
They have found evidence of elemental oxygen production in a polymetallic nodule-covered abyssal seafloor in the Pacific Ocean.
However, for now they have identified neither how the dioxygen is produced nor which is the source of energy for this.
Their hypothesis for how the dioxygen is produced is that there may be a redox reaction between some metals in the polymetallic nodules, which might cause an electric current that could electrolyze the water.
However this hypothesis has very little value until an energy source is identified for it.
The voltage in a battery is not produced between metals in any state, but only between an oxidized metal and a reduced metal. The simplest batteries, like the AA or AAA batteries with saline or alkaline electrolyte, produce voltage by the reaction between reduced zinc and oxidized manganese.
So for a natural battery to form in those polymetallic nodules, some of the metals must be in a reduced state, and for them to be reduced, somewhere there should have been an energy source to provide energy for their reduction.
That must be determined to understand what happens.
I don't even know what this means. The oxygen we breathe has been on the planet for 4+ billion years. We breathe it again and again and again. It's not being produced or consumed in any meaningful sense.
It does get converted between O₂ and CO₂ by a number of processes, but this framing tries to scare the readers to think mining will start slowly suffocating them.
Assuming the ‘geo-battery’ is partly responsible for the DOP observed, the initial high DOP rate may have been related to the ‘bow-wave’ of the lander removing sediments from the surface of the nodules and exposing electrochemically active sites on the nodules
What a sad indictment on modern science.
Far better to mine asteroids. At least destroy non-essential non-inhabited places duh!!
I had a entomologist friend that pointed out that each little body of standing water has dozens of unique species of bugs and you can theoretically just say any piece of land needs to be conserved because destroying it will destroy an entire species.
Again not saying it would be good or bad to mine this stuff. (On first glance it sounds bad to reduce the oxygen we breath). Im just saying caution should always be used with this kind of stuff.
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