2023-07-06 14:43:21
As early as 2016, geologists investigating a Canadian mine made a very special geological discovery discovery. At a depth of about three kilometers, they encountered flowing water that, according to tests, is at least two billion years old.
Water Discovery surprised
Even more remarkable, the liquid has been isolated all along and is thought to be the oldest water yet found on Earth. Three years earlier, researchers sea the BBC made a similar discovery in the same place: water about 1.5 billion years old. However, the 2016 investigation led another team to a deeper well that was even older.
Professor Barbara Sherwood Lollar, who led the team that made the discovery, said: “When people think about this water, they assume it must be a tiny amount of water trapped in the rock. But in reality it is gushing straight at us. These things are flowing at a rate of several liters per minute – the volume of water is much larger than expected.”
Evidence of life forms discovered
The researchers also found chemical traces in the water, left by tiny protozoa that once lived in the liquid. “By examining the sulfate in the water, we were able to detect a fingerprint that indicates the presence of life,” Lollar said.
According to the professor, the microbes that produced this signature could not have done so overnight: “This must be an indication that organisms were present in these fluids over a geological time period.”
The researchers emphasize that examining such discoveries could provide clues to where life might be found elsewhere in the solar system, such as in the oceans on the icy moons of Saturn and Jupiter.
That’s what the water tastes like
When asked what the world’s oldest water tastes like, Sherwood gave Lollar across from CNN another answer: “If you’re a geologist working with rocks, you’ve probably licked a lot of rocks.”
She also tasted the water accordingly on her finger. She was looking for a salty taste, because salty water tends to be older. Much to their delight, the water was “very salty and bitter” and “much saltier than sea water.” This is not surprising considering that the water had matured over two billion years.
Sources: BBC, CNN
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