Deep-Sea Creatures

While walking along the seashore, you must have noticed seaweed and various sea plants.. These and some microscopic planktons produce their own nourishment by way of photosynthesis. This represents the first step in the marine food chain. However, sunlight cannot penetrate deeper than 100 meters (328 feet) in sea water, and the deepest ocean depth is 11,000 meters (36,090 feet) beneath the surface, with an average depth of 5,000 meters (16,400 feet). There is no possibility of photosynthesis taking place there, under conditions of high pressure per square inch, a low temperature in the region of 2 to -4 degrees Celsius (35 to 39 degrees Fahrenheit), and constant darkness. The only food sources consist of waste products and organic substances raining down from higher up. In short, the environment is completely different from what humans are familiar with. Despite all these inhospitable conditions, however, various fish and very different invertebrate creatures and micro-organisms still thrive in the ocean depths.

Temperature, pressure, the density of foodstuffs and light levels vary according to the further down from the surface one descends. Yet living things with structures and systems suited to their environment are found at all depths. Down there are fish, mussels, sea lilies, sponges, crustaceans, shrimps, crabs, arthropods, octopuses, ink fish, worms with spiny bodies, starfish, sea urchins, jellyfish, lobsters, single-celled organisms and organisms whose names can be encountered only in advanced biology texts and can be seen only in nature documentaries, all of them unique to the ocean depths.

Frederick Grassle and Nancy Maciolek, well-known American marine ecologists, say there may be 10 million species beneath the sea,⁶⁷ and an astonishing wealth of species several thousand meters beneath the surface, in an environment previously believed to contain no life at all. Based on his research, Grassle, Director of the Rutgers University Marine and Coastal Research Institute, makes the following comment:

This sampling revealed that the deep-sea may, in fact, rival tropical rainforests in terms of the numbers of species present. Thus the deep sea may physically resemble a desert, but in terms of species composition, it is more like a tropical rainforest. ⁶⁸

In one study 1,500-2,500-m depth range off New Jersey and Delaware, 30 cm x 30 cm samples of sea water contained 798 species in 171 families and 14 phyla.⁶⁹ In another study performed off the coast of southern Australia, more than 800 species were determined in 10 square meters (11.96 square yards) of the sea floor.⁷⁰

Yet a large part of the oceans have still not been the subject of scientific research. Much of the bottom of the world's oceans are still unexplored and unmapped.⁷¹ Therefore, every new investigation reveals some previously unknown species.

One biological phenomenon discovered at the beginning of the 21st century was that in the ocean floor's mud layer, certain bacteria and archaeobacteria consume methane, and thus perform an activity of vital importance to our lives. It is thought that these micro-organisms consume devour 300 million tons of methane every year, about as much as humans now inject into the atmosphere with agriculture, landfills, and burning of fossil fuels.⁷² Therefore, as stated in Science magazine of July 20, 2001, "These methane-eating microbes—once thought to be impossible—now look to be profoundly important to the planet's carbon cycle."⁷³

Another striking fact is the flawless co-operation and order among the bacteria in question, revealed only with this century's technology: Thanks to archaeobacteria (which have a number of different structural features) bacteria can feed on methane in an oxygen-free environment, because the archaeobacteria in turn provide the oxygen that the bacteria need.

These creatures, too small to be seen with the naked eye, live thousands of meters down in the oceans in a layer of mud containing no oxygen, where they work non-stop. What would happen if these single-celled organisms disappeared? Their importance is crystal clear: Should these micro-organisms vanish, then large quantities of methane gas ion in the sea bed would enter the atmosphere. Global warning of mud due to the greenhouse effect would occur. The climatic balance would be damaged all over the world, and the Earth would become a planet too hot for us to live on.

In 2001, it was learned that certain species of bacteria live beneath the ocean bed, in the Earth's crust.⁷⁴ These organisms' natural habitat lies up to 300 meters (985 feet) beneath the ocean floor, and thousands of meters under the surface. The activities they carry out are equally astonishing. These bacteria feed on rocks, and in doing so, perform another task of the greatest importance to all living things, making a major contribution to the flow of elements and chemical substances in the oceans.75 Note that these single-celled organisms do something, so important to life on Earth, that even the entire world's laboratories and scientists could not manage were they to join forces.

Another ecosystem on the ocean floor is found around hydrothermal vents,⁷⁶ where superheated water containing various minerals emerges from cracks in the Earth's crust. More than 300 unique species have so far been discovered living in close proximity around these springs, which were discovered only in the past 20 years.⁷⁷ This environment is home to large tube worms several meters in length and covered in bright red hairs, giant oysters, mussels, squid and invertebrates with all kinds of different appearances. Understandably, it has attracted great interest from researchers. In the search to answer how these creatures find food, astonishing facts have emerged.

The tube worm found in the ecosystem around these hydrothermal vents is very different from the other worms we are familiar with: It has no mouth or digestive system! It meets its nutritional needs thanks to the bacteria that live inside its tissues—a total of 285 billion bacteria per ounce of tissue.⁷⁸ These bacteria perform chemosynthesis, transforming chemical substances that emerge from the springs into nutrients, which the worms use to live.

The bacteria at the bottom of the ocean are the first link in the food chain. Thanks to these micro-organisms, some invertebrates able to survive, and some animals, such as the squid, survive thanks to these invertebrates. The wealth of species and harmony among them, in an environment that until recently was thought to contain no life at all, is truly amazing.

Also, it was recently established that various species are living near the water leaks on the ocean floor, which are chemically rich but cold. Each new study and development indicates how little we know about the richness of the ocean bed.

Bear in mind that submarines used in deep-sea exploration were developed only in the last 70 years. The exploring submarines that dive down thousands of meters have been specially designed by experts from various fields. Similarly, each species that has lived for millions of years at the bottoms of the deepest oceans has also been created with a structure appropriate to its hostile environment. Moreover, the mechanisms in these creatures' cells are many times more complex than the systems in research submarines. Structures so complex cannot, as evolution claims, have come into being by chance. The variety of living things in the depths of the oceans, and their superior characteristics, belong to God, the Creator of all things.

References

67. J.F. Grassle, N.J. Maciolek, "Deep-Sea Species Richness: Regional and Local Diversity Estimates From Quantitative Bottom Samples", American Naturalist, vol. 139, 1992, p. 313-341. ↩
68. Marcia Collie, Julie Russo, "Deep-Sea ↩
69. .F. Grassle, N.J. Maciolek, "Deep-Sea Species Richness: Regional and Local Diversity Estimates from Quantitative Bottom Samples," American Naturalist, Vol. 139, No. 2, February 1992, pp. 313-341. ↩
70. G.C.B. Poore, G.D.F. Wilson, "Marine Species Richness," Nature, Vol. 361, 1993, p. 579. ↩
71. "Ocean", http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean ↩
72. Raşit Gürdilek, "Dünyayı Kurtaran Mikroplar" Bilim ve Teknik, September 2001, p. 10. ↩
73. Carl Zimmer, "Inconceivable Bugs Eat Methane on the Ocean Floor," Science, Vol. 293, 20 July 2001, pp. 418-419. ↩
74. David Whitehouse, "The Microbes That Rule the World," BBC News Online, 28 September 2001, http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1569000/1569264.stm ↩
76. Francesco Canganella, "Hydrothermal Vent Communities," Encyclopedia of Life Sciences, 2000, ğ.els.net. ↩
77. "Sea Connections", Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies, 2001, http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/lesson_plans/ocean/connect/essay.html ↩
78. Ibid. ↩