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James Cameron expedition finds weird deep-sea life

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SCULLIBUNDO

Banned
Cameron was holding out on us!

The deepest place on the planet may also hold the clues to the origin of life on Earth.

The discovery of microbial mats — bizarre-looking, filamentlike clumps of microorganisms — living off chemicals from altered rocks 35,803 feet beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean comes from samples and video collected by an unmanned lander, part of movie director James Cameron's mission to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Researchers have speculated that a similar setup may have sparked the chemical steps that lead to life on Earth, and possibly elsewhere in the solar system.

"We do think that this chemistry could be the roots for metabolism," said Kevin Hand, an astrobiologist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif. "It could be the driving engine that leads to the emergence of life," he said. "Perhaps not just here, but also on worlds like Europa," an icy moon of Jupiter.

Cameron's Deepsea Challenger expedition made dives to the New Britain Trench and the Mariana Trench in the southwestern Pacific Ocean between Jan. 31 and April 3, with one manned dive to Mariana's Challenger Deep, the dark, flat pool that scientists now know houses a surprising array of life. A peek at results from the expedition were presented to a packed audience here Tuesday (Dec. 4) at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union.
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Giant, 7-inch-long amphipods, a shrimplike crustacean that may scavenge fallen logs in the trench,were trapped at nearly 7 miles below the surface in Challenger Deep and hauled back to the ship. Tests reveal the creatures contain compounds that help tissues and proteins function better at high pressure, including scyllo-inositol. The compound is identical to a drug used in clinical trials to break down the amyloid plaques associated with Alzheimer's disease, said Doug Bartlett, a microbiologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego.

Some 20,000 microbes from the trench are being picked over and will undergo genetic analysis, he said. There were also abundant numbers of xenophyophores, a giant amoeba that is among the largest individual cells in existence.
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E

ElectricBlue187

Member
The discovery of microbial mats — bizarre-looking, filamentlike clumps of microorganisms — living off chemicals from altered rocks 35,803 feet beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean
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I bet this kind of thing lives on Titan or Europa, whichever one has the liquid ocean
 
L

lastplayed

Member
Deep-sea life... fuck that shit.

pycno.jpg
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B

BobLoblaw

Banned
I clicked on the link, but all I saw was another story off to the side called, "Orgasm disorder leads to suicide." I read that story too. This one was less depressing.
 
X

Xeke

Banned
His name is James Cameron, the bravest pioneer, no budget too steep, no sea to deep, who's that? It's him! James Cameron.
 
S

StreetsAhead

Member
James Cameron doesn't do what James Cameron does because he's James Cameron, James Cameron does what he does because that it what James Cameron does.

Or something.
 
P

Protein

Banned
If James Cameron finds the origin of life before NASA. Oh my. Dat Titanic and Avatar money being put to good use.
 
K

Kammie

Member
Awesome. I was really disappointed when they said they found nothing. Too bad it was more important to them to sell a documentary. The excitement level was unequaled for a lot of us while this was happening. Not everyone will be aware of the discovery now.
 
Duane Cunningham

Duane Cunningham

Member
We've got some new friends down there. Guess they've been there a while. It bothers them to see us hurting each other. The want us to grow up a bit and put away the childish things.
 
A

Aaron

Member
StudioTan said:
I haven't watched South Park in years, were they really making fun of James Cameron for doing this?

Who cares if he's a director? I takes balls and skill to do this, you have to respect it.
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It's one of the best things they've done in years so you should probably watch it. I believe the name of the ep is Raising the Bar.
 
X

Xeke

Banned
StreetsAhead said:
James Cameron doesn't do what James Cameron does because he's James Cameron, James Cameron does what he does because that it what James Cameron does.

Or something.
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James Cameron doesn't do what James Cameron does for James Cameron. James Cameron does what James Cameron does because James Cameron is James Cameron.
 
S

SCULLIBUNDO

Banned
Don't think it's worth its own thread, but Cameron will be part of a Google Hangout live Q+A today/tomorrow.

Robert Ballard, Jane Goodall and James Cameron — along with National Geographic explorers in the field on every continent — will take questions from the public in a live Google+ Hangout from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. (ET) this Sunday, Jan. 13, marking the 125th anniversary of the National Geographic Society. People around the world are invited to submit questions for the explorers or to videotape themselves asking a question for use in the Hangout.
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