Organisms That Breathe Arsenic Discovered In the Pacific Ocean

Researchers at the University of Washington have discovered that some microbes in the Pacific Ocean actively breath arsenic. 'The discovery has implications for how life may adapt to a changing climate, as well as where we might find it on other planets,' reports New Atlas. From the report: The discovery was made in water samples gathered in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Mexico. After conducting genetic analyses on DNA from those samples, the team found two genetic pathways that are known to help organisms gain energy by converting one form of arsenic molecule into another, and back again. Arsenic-breathing microbes have previously been found in hot springs or lakes with high arsenic levels, but finding them in the ocean, where there isn't all that much arsenic to begin with, is quite strange.

'We've known for a long time that there are very low levels of arsenic in the ocean,' says Gabrielle Rocap, co-author of the study. 'But the idea that organisms could be using arsenic to make a living -- it's a whole new metabolism for the open ocean.' That said, it does seem to be a very small population -- less than one percent of the microbes in these waters. They appear to be distantly related to the other arsenic-respiring species on land and in lakes, which may suggest that this survival strategy is a holdover from an ancient time, when the levels of arsenic were naturally much higher. The study has been published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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