Temperature limits to deep subseafloor life in the Nankai Trough subduction zone

• DOI: 10.1126/science.abd7934
• Publication Date: 2020-12-04T00:05:39Z
• Authors: Verena B. Heuer; Fumio Inagaki; Yuki Morono; Yusuke Kubo; Arthur J. Spivack; Bernhard Viehweger; Tina Treude; Felix Beulig; Florence Schubotz; Satoshi Tonai; Stephen A. Bowden; Margaret Cramm; Susann Henkel; Takehiro Hirose; Kira Homola; Tatsuhiko Hoshino; Akira Ijiri; Hiroyuki Imachi; Nana Kamiya; Masanori Kaneko; Lorenzo Lagostina; Hayley Manners; Harry-Luke McClel...; Kyle Metcalfe; Natsumi Okutsu; Donald Pan; Maija J. Raudsepp; Justine Sauvage; Man-Yin Tsang; David T. Wang; Emily Whitaker; Yuzuru Yamamoto; Kiho Yang; Lena Maeda; Rishi R. Adhikari; Clemens Glombitza; Yohei Hamada; Jens Kallmeyer; Jenny Wendt; Lars Wörmer; Yasuhiro Yamada; Masataka Kinoshita; Kai-Uwe Hinrichs
• Keywords: Seafloor Spreading

Deep, hot, and more alive than we thought Marine sediments represent a massive microbial ecosystem, but still do not fully understand what factors shape limit life underneath the seafloor. Analyzing samples from subduction zone off coast of Japan, Heuer et al. found that life, in particular bacterial vegetative cells, decreases as depth temperature increases down to ∼600 meters below seafloor, corresponding temperatures ∼70°C. Below this limit, endospores are common—a remnant, potential reservoir, life. Deeper is sterile zone, 1000 scalding realm populated by cells. At such great depths, high concentrations acetate sulfate coexist, there also signs hyperthermophilic methanogenesis. These data provide fascinating window into an extreme inhospitable environment nonetheless supports Science , issue p. 1230