Almost All The Viruses Found in a Vast Deep-Sea Mining Zone Were New to Science - ScienceAlert
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Deep in the abyss of the Pacific Ocean, the Clarion-Clipperton Fracture Zone is home to the world's largest accumulation of polymetallic nodules. Several countries are exploring it intensively because of the potential of its mineral wealth, but it's also an incredibly unique habitat, with many recent scientific expeditions bringing back reports of never-before-seen lifeforms. A new study adds a huge array of viruses to the biodiversity of this contested region, 99 percent of which have never been documented before. The researchers – Bowen Hou and Lilan Zhang, of Chongqing University, and Dong Sung, of China's Second Institute of Oceanography – investigated the 'virome' of the Clarion-Clipperton to establish what they call a "vital pre-mining baseline of microbial ecosystem for future environmental impact assessments. "They've published their results in Nature Communications. Polymetallic nodules are at the center of a race to mine the deep sea, because they're full of metals that can be used to make electronics. The International Seaboard Authority has granted 31 deep-sea mineral mining exploration contracts.
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