NEW YORK — Scientists have discovered communities of marine life, including jellyfish, tube worms and brittle stars, thriving in a millions-of-years-old whale graveyard.
These cemeteries are formed when whale carcasses fall to the seafloor, becoming food for nearby creatures. This one, located at a depth of up to 7 kilometers (23,000 feet) in the southeast Indian Ocean, covers the largest area and is, so far, the deepest and oldest one found.
The enormous size of whales and the unique chemistry of their bones are the keys to the formation of these unique underwater habitats, stated Xikun Song, a biologist at the Institute of Deep-Sea Science and Engineering of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
“At the same time, the very nature of the deep ocean makes these deposits exceptionally difficult for scientists to locate,” wrote Song, who participated in the latest discovery, in an email.
Re
More Read
In 2023, researchers explored the remains during several underwater expeditions, collecting samples and mapping the extent of the necropolis. They found five sites of corpses and fossils, including skulls of beaked whales and baleen whales. The oldest bones date back 5.3 million years.
Countless creatures, both large and small, lived off the carcasses, including sea cucumbers, squat lobsters, and clams. Many of them are likely species never before documented, according to findings published Wednesday in the journal Nature.
“The potential number of specimens is simply staggering,” said paleontologist Stephen Godfrey of the Calvert Marine Museum in Maryland, who was not involved in the research.
More Read
According to the study’s authors, it is likely that many factors combined to preserve the bones for millions of years. Their density was sufficient to resist attacks from bone-eating worms, and their location at a sufficient depth in the ocean prevented them from being buried by dust and loose particles. Furthermore, the bones were coated in a thin layer of minerals from the surrounding seawater, which may have prevented their degradation.
Why did so many whales die here? Perhaps they already inhabited the area and died of natural causes. Some could have perished from exhaustion or illnesses derived from deep-sea diving. The shape of the terrain, similar to a V, could also have channeled the remains to their resting place, the authors wrote.
These discoveries are important because they allow scientists to learn about the vibrant communities that find a way to get ahead even in remote and hard-to-reach environments.
The study of whale graveyards “is important to understand how life can adapt to such extreme conditions, not only due to the lack of light and oxygen, but also to the incredibly high pressure,” said Giovanni Bianucci, co-author of the study and paleontologist at the University of Pisa in Italy, in an email.
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. AP is solely responsible for all content.
