Unique Species of Shrimp, Anemones Thrive Near Caribbean Seafloor Vents

January 13, 2012

British scientists say world's deepest volcanic vents - discovered in 2010 in a canyon on the Caribbean seafloor - have much marine life, including new species of shrimp and snails.

A team of British scientists has published new details of the world’s deepest volcanic vents, discovered in 2010 in a canyon on the Caribbean seafloor. Although the vents are gushing liquid minerals estimated to be hotter than 450 degrees Celsius, they are surrounded by a remarkable abundance of marine life, including species of shrimp and snails never seen before

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The volcanic vents were discovered five kilometers down near the bottom of Cayman Trough - an undersea trench south of the Cayman Islands. Expedition co-leader Jon Copley, a marine biologist of the University of Southampton in England spoke to us via Skype.

“Deep sea vents are hot springs on the ocean floor. They are a little bit like the geysers you may know from Yellowstone Park in the U.S., except they are underwater... [and] they are not erupting steam. They are erupting really hot fluid, still liquid, loaded with dissolved minerals that form particles that looked like smoke and that’s why we nicknamed them 'black smokers',” said Copley.

Hot fluid from Earth's crust

Although they didn’t measure the vent temperatures directly, the scientists estimate that the dark material spewing out - mostly copper and other dissolved minerals - is hotter than 450 degrees Celsius.