When an submerged volcano erupted in 2015 it produce a new island as the Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai island emerged from the ocean . It would live tight and die untried with just a seven - year lifespan from egress to submersion , but in those myopic few age , a team of scientists had time to scan the novel island for planetary house of life story . And boy , would they find it .
“ These types of volcanic blast befall all over the world , but they do n’t normally produce islands , ” said Nick Dragone , CIRES PhD educatee who worked on the island , in astatement . “ We had an incredibly alone chance . No one had ever comprehensively study the microorganisms on this character of island system at such an early microscope stage before . ”
The unique chance to study a brand new island cave in Dragone and colleague an " unparalleled natural science laboratory " in which to contemplate the early stages of the ontogenesis of an ecosystem , even before plants and animals come into the characterisation . They were calculate for the microscopical island residents , and to find them they took soil samples that were then analyzed using deoxyribonucleic acid sequencing .
The island of Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai, Kingdom of Tonga and the locations of 32 surfaces where samples were collected. Image credit: Worldview-2 image © 2010, 2018 Maxar,CC BY 4.0
“ We did n’t see what we were expecting , ” said Dragone . “ We thought we ’d see organisms you find when a glacier retreats , or cyanobacteria , more distinctive early colonizer species – but instead we found a unique group of bacterium that metabolise sulfur and atmospherical gases . ”
The island ’s volcanic stock likely explain the unusual cast of microbes as they like to consume the sulfur and hydrogen sulfide gas that are so common on islands deliver of eruptions . For this reason , microbic ecosystems often mirror those establish in standardised places , such as hydrothermal vent , hot springs , and other volcanic regions .
It was an exciting and unequaled adventure for the team of scientist working on Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai , but it would n’t last long . Seven geezerhood after it first rose out of the sea , the island was destroy by the very affair that add it into being : a volcanic eructation .
The Hunga Tonga - Hunga Ha’apai vent that irrupt beneath the Pacific Ocean onJanuary 15 , 2022 , had a clap so strong itlaunched a prodigious plume of waterto a height of 53 kilometers ( 33 mil ) . The eruption transferred roughly 146 billion kilograms ( 322 billion pounds ) of urine into the stratosphere , and put down the island that Dragone and colleagues had been working on right up until the ruinous result .
“ We were all expect the island to stick , ” Dragone excuse . “ In fact , the week before the island exploded we were start out to project a comeback trip . ”
The team were no-good to see their temporary field internet site go , but you never have it away what the future holds when working in volcanically participating region .
“ We are of course let down that the island is gone , but now we have a deal of predictions about what happens when islands form , ” Dragone reason . “ If something formed again , we would lie with to go there and collect more datum . We would have a plot plan of how to study it . ”
The report was issue inmBio .
