Mangank noodles on the seabed can be a source of oxygen
Science historical images/alamy
Marine scientists who made headlines last year with their discovery that the deep-sea nodes could produce “dark oxygen”, embarking on a three-year research project to explain their findings.
In the midst of swirling controversy over their research, says project manager Andrew Sweetman at the Scottish Association for Marine Science, that he hopes the new scheme will “show once and for all” that metallic clumps of rock are sources of the oxygen oxygen and begin to explain , how the process works. “We know it’s going on and what we need to do now is to show it again, and then really start to get the mechanism,” he says.
Sweetman had spent more than a decade of studying life on the seabed before his shock discovery made headlines last July and confused the research community. Previously, it was believed that oxygen production was dependent on the presence of plants, algae or cyanobacteria to perform photosynthesis, driven by sunlight.
But Sweetman’s team found increasing levels of oxygen in nodular areas of the seabed, thousands of meters below sea level where no light can penetrate and no plants grow. The researchers suggested that nodes could act as “geobotteries” and generate an electric current that divides water molecules into hydrogen and “dark” oxygen, produced naturally without photosynthesis.
Sweetman was in the center of a media storm. Life changed overnight, he says – he is even stopped on the street by people who want a photograph with him. “It’s been very surreal,” he says.
But the discovery also brought challenges. The research has attractive criticism from some researchers and deep -hearted mining companies that plan to exploit the nodes for precious affairs for the green energy transition.
Metalls Company (TMC), which funded some of the research that led to Sweetman’s paper from 2024, has been among the harder critics of his findings. Its scientists have published a paper arguing that the discovery is “completely supported” by evidence and raises concerns about the methodology of the study.
“After decades of research using the same method, no credible scientist has been exposed to ‘dark oxygen’,” said Gerard Barron, CEO and chairman of the metal company, in a statement. “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. We are still waiting . ”
Other researchers have also raised concerns about Sweetman’s use of data and say defective equipment or abuse of Landers could have produced unusual readings. So far, none of the responsibility has completed the Peer Review process.
There are also raised concerns with the newspaper that published Sweetman’s study, Nature Geoscience. “We’ve looked at [these concerns] After an established process gently. However, no decision has been made as to which action can be taken. New scientist.
Sweetman insists that his study is an accident and he will respond to TMC’s criticism in a formal disgust to their paper. But he says his experience in the center of controversy has been “extremely tiring” and disturbing. “There has been plenty of discussion. A lot of mining companies have said lots of different things, much of it not so nice, which has been a challenge to live through, ”he says. “It certainly had a little influence on me. Online bullying has been nice to be exposed to and it has been continuous.
Sweetman’s new research project, funded through a 2 million -pound subsidy from Japanese charity Nippon Foundation, aims to put some of the controversy to rest. Sweetman’s team will use brand new, custom -built Landers, which is capable of falling to 12,000 meters below sea level, twice as much as the previous study, which has been chased specifically for dark oxygen production in the Pacific.
The first of three research expeditions will sail in January 2026 from San Diego, California, with the aim of configuring the nodule-driven oxygen production in the deep sea with fresh data. Once again, the lands seal the lands of water and sediment from the seabed to measure changes in oxygen concentrations. The researchers will also test for the presence of hydrogen, which would also be produced if electrolysis of seawater occurs. And they will inject isotopically labeled water into samples to trace any chemical changes to the elements.
Sweetman is Bullish about the prospect of finding dark oxygen production. “I know It is happens. We’ve found this now in six places. I know we find it, ”he says.
Another two expeditions will try to investigate which microbial or electrochemical Méchanisms can play, and begin to explore the potential contribution of dark oxygen production in deep sea ecosystems. It is the first study of its kind that directly explored these processes – Sweetman’s original discovery was at his owl recording “Serendipitous”. “I didn’t go out to show this; We just set out to measure bread pension in the seabed, ”he says of his first work.
NASA is also interested in studying the knots, says Sweetman, to investigate what similar processes could support life on other moons and planets.
Deep Sea Eggs will see the project closely. They hope to start operations later in the year, but are still waiting for the authority of the international seabed to end its rules for deep -sea smith. More evidence of the deep sea oxygen production would give a serious blow to their hope of establishing a mining sector on the seabed.
Sweetman says companies should keep out of mining of the seabed until researchers know more about the potential role of dark oxygen production in sea ecosystems. “Everything we ask for is a little more time to go out and try to find out what’s going on,” he says.
Article Fonnded on January 24, 2025
The article was changed to properly attribute some of the critics of Sweetman’s research.
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