Deep beneath the Arctic Ocean on the peaks of extinct subaquatic volcanoes , scientists have discovered vast garden ofsea spongesthat endure by eat on the fossils of extinct animals that perished thousands of years ago .
The new breakthrough of fossil - munching spongesis like nothing scientist have ever seen before . report the new research in the journalNature Communications , the international team of scientists excuse that this discovery aid to solve the mystery of how brute life can pull through and fly high under the ice - cover Arctic Ocean where distinctive food origin ca n’t reach .
" prosper on top of extinct volcanic seamounts of the Langseth Ridge we rule monumental poriferan garden but did not love what they were feed on , " Antje Boetius , chief scientist of the expedition from Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology , said in astatement .
To find oneself out how they were surviving , the team took sample of the sponges taken from the Langseth Ridge - an underwater mountain compass not far from the North Pole - and closely calculate at the distribution of the sponge gardens on the seafloor . Chemical unconscious process going on within the sponge showed that they were , rather bizarrely , fix their solid food from fossilized tubes of dirt ball and the hardened detritus of other extinct animals .
" Our analysis disclose that thespongeshave microbic symbionts that are able to use one-time organic matter , " explainedTeresa Morganti , first - author of the subject area and sponge expert from the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology . " This allows them to feed on the remainder of former , now nonextant inhabitants of the seamounts , such as the tubes of insect compose of protein and chitin and other trapped detritus . "
However , the sponges involve some help to chomp on fogy . Spongesare considered to be one of the wide-eyed form of animal life — despite their appearance , they are animals , not plans or kingdom Fungi — but they maintain a complex symbiotic relationship with bacteria that populate within them .
These bacterium are cater with a home and in return pay their “ rip ” by pumping out antibiotics , which help the sponges ’ health . It grow out , the microbe also help oneself out the sponges by digesting and unthaw fossils ' super - tough textile , freeing it up as intellectual nourishment for the sponge .
“ This is a unique ecosystem , " reason Boetius . " We have never find out anything like it before in the gamy Central Arctic . In the subject field area , principal productivity in the overlying water provides less than one percent of the sponge ’ carbon demand . Thus , this sponge garden may be a transient ecosystem , but it is plenteous in species , including flabby corals . "
