The deepest Mariana Trench is located in. The amazing Mariana Trench is the deepest place on earth
Despite the fact that the oceans are closer to us than the distant planets of the solar system, people Only five percent of the ocean floor has been explored, which remains one of the greatest mysteries of our planet. The deepest part ocean - Mariana Trench or Mariana Trenchis one of the most famous places, about which we still don’t know very much.
With water pressure that is a thousand times greater than at sea level, diving into this place is akin to suicide.
But thanks to modern technology and a few brave souls who risked their lives and went down there, we learned a lot of interesting things about this amazing place.
Mariana Trench on the map. Where is it?
The Mariana Trench or Mariana Trench is located in the western Pacific east (approximately 200 km) of 15 Mariana Islands near Guam. It is a crescent-shaped trench in the earth's crust about 2,550 km long and an average width of 69 km.
Mariana Trench coordinates: 11°22′ north latitude and 142°35′ east longitude.
Depth of the Mariana Trench
According to the latest research in 2011, the depth of the deepest point of the Mariana Trench is about 10,994 meters ± 40 meters. For comparison, the height of the highest peak in the world, Everest, is 8,848 meters. This means that if Everest were in the Mariana Trench, it would be covered by another 2.1 km of water.
Here are other interesting facts about what you can find along the way and at the very bottom of the Mariana Trench.
Temperature at the bottom of the Mariana Trench
1. Very hot water
Going down to such depths, we expect it to be very cold. The temperature here reaches just above zero, varying 1 to 4 degrees Celsius.
However, at a depth of about 1.6 km from the surface of the Pacific Ocean there are hydrothermal vents called “black smokers”. They shoot water that heats up to 450 degrees Celsius.
This water is rich in minerals that help support life in the area. Despite the water temperature being hundreds of degrees above boiling point, she doesn't boil here due to incredible pressure, 155 times higher than on the surface.
Inhabitants of the Mariana Trench
2. Giant toxic amoebas
A few years ago, at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, giant 10-centimeter amoebae called xenophyophores.
These single-celled organisms likely became so large because of the environment they live in at a depth of 10.6 km. Cold temperatures, high pressure and lack of sunlight likely contributed to these amoebas have acquired enormous dimensions.
In addition, xenophyophores have incredible abilities. They are resistant to many elements and chemicals, including uranium, mercury and lead,which would kill other animals and people.
3. Shellfish
The intense water pressure in the Mariana Trench does not give any animal with a shell or bones a chance of survival. However, in 2012, shellfish were discovered in a trench near serpentine hydrothermal vents. Serpentine contains hydrogen and methane, which allows living organisms to form.
TO How did mollusks preserve their shells under such pressure?, remains unknown.
In addition, hydrothermal vents emit another gas, hydrogen sulfide, which is lethal to shellfish. However, they learned to bind the sulfur compound into a safe protein, which allowed the population of these mollusks to survive.
At the bottom of the Mariana Trench
4. Pure liquid carbon dioxide
Hydrothermal source of Champagne The Mariana Trench, which lies outside the Okinawa Trench near Taiwan, is the only known underwater area where liquid carbon dioxide can be found. The spring, discovered in 2005, was named after the bubbles that turned out to be carbon dioxide.
Many believe these springs, called "white smokers" due to their lower temperatures, may be the source of life. It was in the depths of the oceans, with low temperatures and an abundance of chemicals and energy, that life could begin.
5. Slime
If we had the opportunity to swim to the very depths of the Mariana Trench, we would feel that it covered with a layer of viscous mucus. Sand, in its familiar form, does not exist there.
The bottom of the depression mainly consists of crushed shells and plankton remains that have accumulated at the bottom of the depression for many years. Due to the incredible water pressure, almost everything there turns into fine grayish-yellow thick mud.
Mariana Trench
6. Liquid sulfur
Daikoku Volcano, which lies at a depth of about 414 meters on the way to the Mariana Trench, is the source of one of the rarest phenomena on our planet. Here is lake of pure molten sulfur. The only place where liquid sulfur can be found is Jupiter's moon Io.
In this pit, called the "cauldron", there is a bubbling black emulsion boils at 187 degrees Celsius. Although scientists have not been able to explore this site in detail, it is possible that even more liquid sulfur is contained deeper. It may reveal the secret of the origin of life on Earth.
According to the Gaia hypothesis, our planet is one self-governing organism in which everything living and nonliving is connected to support its life. If this hypothesis is correct, then a number of signals can be observed in the natural cycles and systems of the Earth. So the sulfur compounds created by organisms in the ocean must be stable enough in the water to allow them to move into the air and return to land.
7. Bridges
At the end of 2011, it was discovered in the Mariana Trench four stone bridges, which extended from one end to the other for 69 km. They appear to have formed at the junction of the Pacific and Philippine tectonic plates.
One of the bridges Dutton Ridge, which was discovered back in the 1980s, turned out to be incredibly high, like a small mountain. At the highest point the ridge reaches 2.5 km over the Challenger Deep.
Like many aspects of the Mariana Trench, the purpose of these bridges remains unclear. However, the very fact that these formations were discovered in one of the most mysterious and unexplored places is surprising.
8. James Cameron's Dive into the Mariana Trench
Since opening the deepest part of the Mariana Trench - the Challenger Deep in 1875, only three people visited here. The first were American Lieutenant Don Walsh and researcher Jacques Picard, who dived on January 23, 1960 on the ship Trieste.
52 years later, another person dared to dive here - a famous film director. James Cameron. So On March 26, 2012, Cameron sank to the bottom and took some photos.
In honor of which it, in fact, got its name. The depression is a crescent-shaped ravine on the ocean floor with a length of 2,550 km. with an average width of 69 km. According to the latest measurements (2014), the maximum depth of the Mariana Trench is 10,984 m. This point is located at the southern end of the trench and is called the “Challenger Deep”. Challenger Deep).
The trench was formed at the junction of two lithospheric tectonic plates - the Pacific and Philippine. The Pacific plate is older and heavier. Over the course of millions of years, it “crept” under the younger Philippine Plate.
Opening
The Mariana Trench was first discovered by a scientific expedition of a sailing ship. Challenger" This corvette, which was originally a warship, was converted into a scientific vessel in 1872 specifically for the Royal Society for the Advancement of Natural Sciences of London. The ship was equipped with biochemical laboratories, means for measuring depth, water temperature and soil sampling. That same year, in December, the ship set off for scientific research and spent three and a half years at sea, covering a distance of 70 thousand nautical miles. At the end of the expedition, which was recognized as one of the most scientifically successful since the famous geographical and scientific discoveries of the 16th century, over 4,000 new species of animals were described, in-depth studies of almost 500 underwater objects were carried out, and soil samples were taken from various parts of the world's oceans.
Against the backdrop of the important scientific discoveries made by Challenger, the discovery of an underwater trench especially stood out, the depth of which amazes even contemporaries, not to mention scientists of the 19th century. True, initial depth measurements showed that its depth was just over 8,000 m, but even this value was enough to talk about the discovery of the deepest point known to man on the planet.
The new trench was named the Mariana Trench - in honor of the nearby Mariana Islands, which in turn were named after Marianne of Austria, the Spanish queen, wife of King Philip IV of Spain.
Research into the Mariana Trench continued only in 1951. English hydrographic vessel Challenger II examined the trench using an echo sounder and found that its maximum depth was much greater than previously thought, amounting to 10,899 m. This point was given the name “Challenger Deep” in honor of the first expedition of 1872-1876.
Challenger Abyss
Challenger Abyss is a relatively small flat plain in the south of the Mariana Trench. Its length is 11 km and its width is about 1.6 km. Along its edges there are gentle slopes.
Its exact depth, which is called a meter per meter, is still unknown. This is due to the errors of the echo sounders and sonars themselves, the changing depth of the world's oceans, as well as the uncertainty that the bottom of the abyss itself remains motionless. In 2009, the American vessel RV Kilo Moana determined the depth to be 10,971 m with a probability of error of 22-55 m. Research in 2014 with improved multibeam echo sounders determined the depth to be 10,984. This is exactly what the value is recorded in reference books and is currently considered the closest to the real one.
Dives
Only four scientific vehicles visited the bottom of the Mariana Trench, and only two expeditions included people.
Project "Nekton"
The first descent into the Challenger Abyss took place in 1960 on a manned submersible " Trieste", named after the Italian city of the same name where it was created. It was flown by an American US Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh and Swiss oceanographer Jacques Piccard. The device was designed by Jacques' father, Auguste Piccard, who already had experience in creating bathyscaphes.
Trieste made its first dive in 1953 in the Mediterranean Sea, where it reached a record depth of 3,150 m at that time. In total, the bathyscaphe made several dives between 1953 and 1957. and the experience of its operation has shown that it can dive to more serious depths.
Trieste was purchased by the US Navy in 1958, when the United States became interested in seabed exploration in the Pacific region, where some island states came under de facto jurisdiction as the victorious nation in World War II.
After some modifications, in particular further compaction of the outer part of the hull, Trieste began to be prepared for immersion in the Mariana Trench. Jacques Piccard remained the pilot of the bathyscaphe, since he had the most experience in piloting the Trier in particular and bathyscaphes in general. His companion was Don Walsh, a then-current US Navy lieutenant who served on a submarine and later became a famous scientist and naval specialist.
The project for the first dive to the bottom of the Mariana Trench received a code name Project "Nekton", although this name did not catch on among the people.
The dive began on the morning of January 23, 1960 at 8:23 local time. To a depth of 8 km. the apparatus descended at a speed of 0.9 m/s, and then slowed down to 0.3 m/s. The researchers saw the bottom only at 13:06. Thus, the time of the first dive was almost 5 hours. The submersible stayed at the very bottom for only 20 minutes. During this time, the researchers measured the density and temperature of the water (it was +3.3ºС), measured the radioactive background, and observed an unknown fish similar to a flounder and a shrimp that suddenly appeared at the bottom. Also, based on the measured pressure, the diving depth was calculated, which was 11,521 m, which was later adjusted to 10,916 m.
While at the bottom of the Challenger Abyss we explored and had time to refresh ourselves with chocolate.
After this, the bathyscaphe was freed from ballast and the ascent began, which took less time - 3.5 hours.
Submersible "Kaiko"
Kaiko (Kaikō) - the second of four devices that reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench. But he visited there twice. This uninhabited remote-controlled underwater vehicle was created by the Japan Agency for Marine Science and Technology (JAMSTEC) and was intended to study the deep seabed. The device was equipped with three video cameras, as well as two manipulator arms controlled remotely from the surface.
He made more than 250 dives and made enormous contributions to science, but he made his most famous journey in 1995, diving to a depth of 10,911 m in the Challenger Deep. It took place on March 24 and samples of benthic extremophile organisms were brought to the surface - this is the name of animals capable of surviving in the most extreme environmental conditions.
Kayko returned to the Challenger Deep again a year later, in February 1996, and took samples of soil and microorganisms from the bottom of the Mariana Trench.
Unfortunately, Kaiko was lost in 2003 after the cable connecting it to the carrier vessel broke.
Deep-sea submersible "Nereus"
Unmanned remote-controlled deep-sea vehicle " Nereus"(English) Nereus) closes the trio of devices that reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench. His dive took place in May 2009. Nereus reached a depth of 10,902 m. He was sent to the site of the very first expedition to the bottom of the Challenger Abyss. He stayed at the bottom for 10 hours, broadcasting live video from his cameras to the carrier ship, after which he collected water and soil samples and successfully returned to the surface.
The device was lost in 2014 during a dive into the Kermadec Trench at a depth of 9,900 m.
Deepsea Challenger
The last dive to the bottom of the Mariana Trench was made by the famous Canadian director James Cameron, inscribing itself not only in the history of cinema, but also in the history of great research. It happened on March 26, 2012 on a single-seat submersible Deepsea Challenger, built under the direction of Australian engineer Ron Alloon in collaboration with National Geographic and Rolex. The main objective of this dive was to collect documentary evidence of life at such extreme depths. From the soil samples taken, 68 new animal species were discovered. The director himself said that the only animal he saw at the bottom was an amphipod - an amphipod, similar to a small shrimp about 3 cm in length. The footage formed the basis of a documentary film about his dive into the Challenger Deep.
James Cameron became the third person on Earth to visit the bottom of the Mariana Trench. He set a diving speed record - his submersible reached a depth of 11 km. in less than two hours. He also became the first person to reach such a depth in a solo dive. He spent 6 hours at the bottom, which is also a record. Bathyscaphe Trieste was at the bottom for only 20 minutes.
Animal world
The first Trieste expedition reported with great surprise that there was life at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Although it was previously believed that the existence of life in such conditions was simply not possible. According to Jacques Piccard, they saw at the bottom a fish resembling an ordinary flounder, about 30 cm long, as well as amphipod shrimp. Many marine biologists are skeptical that Trier's crew actually saw the fish, but they do not so much question the researchers' words as they are inclined to believe that they mistook a sea cucumber or other invertebrate for the fish.
During the second expedition, the Kaiko apparatus took soil samples and indeed found many tiny organisms capable of surviving in absolute darkness at temperatures close to 0°C and under monstrous pressure. There is not a single skeptic left who doubts the presence of life everywhere in the ocean, even in the most incredible conditions. However, it remained unclear how developed such deep-sea life was. Or are the only representatives of the Mariana Trench the simplest microorganisms, crustaceans and invertebrates?
In December 2014, a new species of sea slug was discovered - a family of deep-sea marine fish. The cameras recorded them at a depth of 8,145 m, which was an absolute record for fish at that time.
In the same year, cameras recorded several more species of huge crustaceans, differing from their shallow-sea relatives by deep-sea gigantism, which is generally inherent in many deep-sea species.
In May 2017, scientists reported the discovery of another new species of sea slug, which was discovered at a depth of 8,178 m.
All deep-sea inhabitants of the Mariana Trench are almost blind, slow and unpretentious animals capable of surviving in the most extreme conditions. Popular stories that the Challenger Deep is inhabited by marine animals, megalodon and other huge animals are nothing more than fables. The Mariana Trench is fraught with many secrets and mysteries, and new species of animals are no less interesting to scientists than relict animals known since the Paleozoic era. Being at such depths for millions of years, evolution has made them completely different from shallow-water species.
Current research and future dives
The Mariana Trench continues to attract the attention of scientists around the world, despite the high cost of research and its poor practical application. Ichthyologists are interested in new species of animals and their adaptive abilities. Geologists are interested in this region from the point of view of the processes occurring in lithospheric plates and the formation of underwater mountain ranges. Ordinary researchers simply dream of visiting the bottom of the deepest trench on our planet.
Several expeditions to the Mariana Trench are currently planned:
1. American company Triton Submarines develops and produces private underwater bathyscaphes. The newest model Triton 36000/3, consisting of a crew of 3 people, is planned to be sent to the Challenger Abyss in the near future. Its characteristics allow it to reach a depth of 11 km. in just 2 hours.
2. Company Virgin Oceanic(Virgin Oceanic), specializing in private shallow dives, is developing a single-person deep-sea vehicle that can deliver a passenger to the bottom of the trench in 2.5 hours.
3. American company DOER Marine working on a project" Deep Search"—one or two-seater submersible.
4. In 2017, the famous Russian traveler Fedor Konyukhov announced that he plans to reach the bottom of the Mariana Trench.
1. In 2009 it was created Maritime Marianas National Monument. It does not include the islands themselves, but only covers their marine territory, with an area of more than 245 thousand km². Almost the entire Mariana Trench was included in the monument, although its deepest point, the Challenger Deep, was not included in it.
2. At the bottom of the Mariana Trench, the water column exerts a pressure of 1,086 bar. This is a thousand times more than standard atmospheric pressure.
3. Water compresses very poorly and at the bottom of the gutter its density increases by only 5%. This means 100 liters of ordinary water at a depth of 11 km. will occupy a volume of 95 liters.
4. Although the Mariana Trench is considered the deepest point on the planet, it is not the closest point to the center of the Earth. Our planet is not an ideal spherical shape, and its radius is approximately 25 km. less at the poles than at the equator. Therefore, the deepest point on the bottom of the Arctic Ocean is 13 km. closer to the center of the Earth than in the Challenger Deep.
5. The Mariana Trench (and other deep-sea trenches) have been proposed to be used as nuclear waste cemeteries. It is assumed that the movement of plates will “push” waste under the tectonic plate deeper into the Earth. The proposal is not without logic, but the dumping of nuclear waste is prohibited by international law. In addition, zones of junctions of lithospheric plates give rise to earthquakes of enormous force, the consequences of which are unpredictable for buried waste.
The Mariana Trench (or Mariana Trench) became known in 1875, when the British survey ship Challenger first explored the depth of this place using a deep-sea survey.
The ship's crew was probably very surprised when they reeled off kilometers of rope so that the boat could finally reach the bottom. Based on the results of the study, it was determined that at the deepest point the bottom is located at a distance of 8,367 meters from the surface of the ocean.
In 1951, a new British expedition on the Challenger 2 ship, using an echo sounder, determined the depth of the depression at 10,863 ± 100 meters. The depth of the bottom varies depending on its topography. Since then, the deepest point on the planet has been called the Challenger Deep.
Progress moved forward, and people began to think about visiting the bottom of the Mariana Trench using a manned deep-sea vehicle.
The first human dive to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Project "Nekton"
The first two people in history to reach the deepest point on earth were Swiss scientist Jacques Piccard and US Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh.
The device, which made it possible to dive under extreme pressure conditions, was named “Trieste” and was originally built by two Swiss scientist-enthusiasts - Auguste Picard and his son Jacques Picard. After a series of successful dives in the Mediterranean Sea, Trieste was purchased by the US Navy, which was interested in exploring the ocean depths. After modernizing the bathyscaphe, installing a heavy-duty gondola and modern navigation and electronic systems, Trieste was ready to conquer new depths.
The target for the dive was chosen to be no less than the deepest point on the globe. The project, called Necron, planned to take two people to the bottom of the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench and carry out scientific research on the site. On January 23, 1960, at 08:23 local time, the Trieste, with Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh on board, began its slow descent into darkness. After 4 hours 43 minutes, the submersible touched the bottom at a distance of 10,919 meters from the ocean surface.
For the first time, a person found himself at the bottom of the deepest place on the planet. The pressure, 1072 times higher than normal, squeezed the nacelle of the bathyscaphe with terrible force.
The researchers stayed at the bottom for 20 minutes, during which they conducted a number of scientific experiments to measure radiation, measured the water temperature, which was 3.3 °C (the air temperature in the gondola was 4.5 °C), took a large number of photographs of the ocean floor and even we saw a small fish that looked like a flounder.
After dropping the ballast, the bathyscaphe began its ascent, which lasted 3 hours 27 minutes.
For 52 long years, no one else conquered the Mariana Trench, limiting themselves only to the descent of automatic robots into the Challenger Abyss.
Conquest of the Mariana Trench by James Cameron
Who would have thought that the next person who, for the first time in many years, would decide to visit the bottom of the Mariana Trench would not be some ocean scientist, but the famous Hollywood director James Cameron! On March 26, 2012, Cameron dived to a depth of 10,908 meters on the Deepsea Challenger submersible.
Bathyscaphe Deepsea Challenger | The Deepsea Challenger bathyscaphe, containing the latest scientific equipment and 3D cameras, implies the presence of only one pilot in the cockpit, but allows you to stay under water for up to 56 hours and freely maneuver on the ocean floor using 12 electric motors. Its creation, taking into account the design stage, took almost 7 years, and construction was carried out by a private Australian company.
During the study of the bottom of the Mariana Trench, the director conducted video and photography, and also, using manipulators, took samples of ocean soil, where, as it turned out later, microorganisms previously unknown to science were present.
Currently, James Cameron is the third and last person to visit the deepest point on the planet - the Challenger Deep at the very bottom of the Mariana Trench. In total, only two underwater vehicles with people on board sank to the bottom of the Mariana Trench.
Illustration: depositphotos.com | tolokonov
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There are 5 oceans on Earth, which occupy a significant part of the land. Having conquered space and landed a man on the Moon, sending autonomous spacecraft to the most distant planets of the solar system, people know negligible little about what is hidden in the depths of the sea on their home planet.
What is the Mariana Trench?
This is the name of the deepest place in the Pacific Ocean known today. It is a trench formed by the convergence of tectonic plates. The maximum depth of the Mariana Trench is approximately 10,994 meters (2011 data). There are other trenches in all other oceans, but not so deep. Only the Java Trench (7729 meters) can be compared with the Mariana Trench.
Location
The deepest place on Earth is located in the western Pacific Ocean, near the Mariana Islands. The trench stretches along them for one and a half thousand kilometers. The bottom of the depression is flat, its width ranges from 1 to 5 kilometers. The trench got its name in honor of the islands next to which it is located.
"Challenger Deep"
This is the name given to the deepest place (10,994 meters) of the Mariana Trench. Here it is necessary to explain that it is not yet possible to obtain the exact dimensions of this gigantic trough of the ocean floor. The speed of sound at different depths varies greatly, and the Mariana Trench has a very complex structure, so the data obtained using an echo sounder is always slightly different.
History of discovery
People have long known that deep-sea places exist in the seas and oceans. In 1875, the English corvette Challenger opened one of these points. What depth of the Mariana Trench was recorded then? It was 8367 meters. The measuring instruments at that time were far from ideal, but even this result made a stunning impression - it became clear that the deepest point of the ocean floor on the planet had been found.
Gutter studies
In the 19th century, it was simply impossible to explore the bottom of the Mariana Trench. At that time, there was no technology that would allow one to descend to such a depth. Without modern diving equipment, this was tantamount to suicide.
The trench was re-examined many years later, in the next century. Measurements taken in 1951 showed a depth of 10,863 meters. Then, in 1957, members of the Soviet scientific vessel Vityaz studied the depression. According to their measurements, the depth of the Mariana Trench was 11,023 meters.
The last study of the trench was carried out in 2011.
Cameron's Great Journey
The Canadian director became the third person in the history of exploration of the Mariana Trench to descend to its bottom. He was the first in the world to do it alone. Before its sinking, the trench was explored by Don Walsh and Jacques Piccard in 1960 using the bathyscaphe Trieste. In addition, Japanese scientists tried to find out the depth of the Mariana Trench using the Kaiko probe. And in 2009, the Nereus apparatus descended to the bottom of the trench.
Descent to such incredible depths comes with a huge number of risks. First of all, a person is threatened by a monstrous pressure of 1100 atmospheres. It can damage the body of the device, which will lead to the death of the pilot. Another serious danger that lurks when descending to depth is the cold that reigns there. It can not only cause equipment failure, but also kill a person. The bathyscaphe may collide with rocks and be damaged.
For many years, James Cameron dreamed of visiting the deepest point of the Mariana Trench - the Challenger Deep. In order to carry out his plans, he equipped his own expedition. Especially for this, an underwater vehicle was developed and built in Sydney - a single-seat bathyscaphe Deepsea Challenger, equipped with scientific equipment, as well as photo and video cameras. In it, Cameron sank to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. This event occurred on March 26, 2012.
In addition to photographs and video footage, the Deepsea Challenger bathyscaphe had to take new measurements of the trench and try to provide accurate data on its dimensions. Everyone was worried about one question: “How much?” The depth of the Mariana Trench, according to the apparatus, was 10,908 meters.
The director was impressed by what he saw below. Most of all, the bottom of the depression reminded him of a lifeless lunar landscape. He did not meet the terrible inhabitants of the abyss. The only creature he saw through the submersible's porthole was a small shrimp.
After a successful voyage, James Cameron decided to donate his bathyscaphe to the Oceanographic Institute so that it could continue to be used to explore the depths of the sea.
Creepy denizens of the deep
The lower the ocean floor, the less sunlight penetrates through the water column. The depth of the Mariana Trench is the reason that impenetrable darkness always reigns in it. But even the absence of light cannot become an obstacle to the emergence of life. Darkness gives birth to creatures that have never seen the sun. And they, in turn, were only recently able to be seen by marine biologists.
This spectacle is not for the faint of heart. Almost all the inhabitants of the Mariana Trench seem to have been born from the imagination of an artist who creates monsters for horror films. Seeing them for the first time, you might think that they do not live next to humans on the same planet, but are alien creatures, they look so alien.
To some extent, this is true - negligible little is known about the oceans and their inhabitants. The bottom of the Mariana Trench has been explored less than the surface of Mars. Therefore, for a long time it was believed that at such a depth life is impossible without sunlight. It turned out that this was not the case. The depth of the Mariana Trench, gigantic pressure and cold are no obstacle to the birth of amazing creatures living in complete darkness.
Most of them have an ugly appearance due to terrible living conditions. The pitch darkness reigning in the depths made the marine inhabitants of these places completely blind. Many fish have huge teeth, such as howliods, which swallow their prey whole.
What can living creatures that are so far from the surface of the ocean eat? At the bottom of the depression, the remains of living organisms accumulate, forming a multi-meter layer of bottom silt. The inhabitants of the depths feed on these deposits. Predatory fish have luminous areas of the body with which they attract small fish.
The gutter is inhabited by bacteria that can only develop at high pressure, single-celled organisms, jellyfish, worms, mollusks, and sea cucumbers. The depth of the Mariana Trench allows them to reach very large sizes. For example, amphipods found at the bottom of the trench are 17 centimeters long.
Amoebas
Xenophyophores (amoebas) are single-celled organisms that can only be seen with a microscope. But at depth, these inhabitants of the Mariana Trench reach gigantic sizes - up to 10 centimeters. Previously, they were found at a depth of 7500 meters. An interesting feature of these organisms, in addition to their size, is the ability to accumulate uranium, lead and mercury. Externally, deep-sea amoebas look different. Some are disc or tetrahedron shaped. Xenophyophores feed on bottom sediments.
Hirondellea gigas
Large amphipods (amphipods) have been discovered in the Mariana Trench. These deep-sea crayfish feed on dead organic matter that accumulates at the bottom of the depression and have a keen sense of smell. The largest specimen found was 17 centimeters in length.
Holothurians
Sea cucumbers are another representative of organisms that live at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. This class of invertebrates feeds on plankton and bottom sediments.
Conclusion
The Mariana Trench has not yet been properly explored. No one knows what creatures inhabit it and how many secrets it holds.
The most mysterious and inaccessible point on our planet, the Mariana Trench, is called the “fourth pole of the Earth.” It is located in the western part of the Pacific Ocean and extends 2926 km in length and 80 km in width. At a distance of 320 km south of the island of Guam there is the deepest point of the Mariana Trench and the entire planet - 11022 meters. In these little-explored depths hide living creatures whose appearance is as monstrous as their living conditions.
The Mariana Trench is called the "fourth pole of the Earth"
The Mariana Trench, or Mariana Trench, is an oceanic trench in the western Pacific Ocean, which is the deepest geographical feature known on Earth. Research of the Mariana Trench was initiated by the expedition ( December 1872 - May 1876) English ship "Challenger" ( HMS Challenger), which carried out the first systematic measurements of the depths of the Pacific Ocean. This military three-masted corvette with sail rigging was rebuilt as an oceanographic vessel for hydrological, geological, chemical, biological and meteorological work in 1872.
In 1960, a great event took place in the history of the conquest of the world's oceans
The bathyscaphe Trieste, piloted by French explorer Jacques Piccard and US Navy Lieutenant Don Walsh, reached the deepest point of the ocean floor - the Challenger Deep, located in the Mariana Trench and named after the English ship Challenger, from which the first data were obtained in 1951 about her.
Bathyscaphe "Trieste" before diving, January 23, 1960
The dive lasted 4 hours 48 minutes and ended at 10911 m relative to sea level. At this terrible depth, where there is a monstrous pressure of 108.6 MPa ( which is more than 1100 times more than normal atmospheric) flattens all living things, the researchers made a major oceanological discovery: they saw two 30-centimeter flounder-like fish swimming past the porthole. Before this, it was believed that no life existed at depths exceeding 6000 m.
Thus, an absolute record for diving depth was set, which cannot be surpassed even theoretically. Picard and Walsh were the only people to reach the bottom of the Challenger Deep. All subsequent dives to the deepest point of the world's oceans, for research purposes, were made by unmanned robotic bathyscaphes. But there were not so many of them, since “visiting” the Challenger Abyss is both labor-intensive and expensive.
One of the achievements of this dive, which had a beneficial effect on the environmental future of the planet, was the refusal of nuclear powers to bury radioactive waste at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. The fact is that Jacques Picard experimentally refuted the prevailing opinion at that time that at depths above 6000 m there is no upward movement of water masses.
In the 90s, three dives were made by the Japanese Kaiko device, controlled remotely from the “mother” ship via a fiber-optic cable. However, in 2003, while exploring another part of the ocean, the towing steel cable broke during a storm and the robot was lost. The underwater catamaran Nereus became the third deep-sea vehicle to reach the bottom of the Mariana Trench.
In 2009, humanity again reached the deepest point of the world's oceans.
On May 31, 2009, humanity again reached the deepest point of the Pacific, and indeed the entire world ocean - the American deep-sea vehicle Nereus sank into the Challenger failure at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. The device took soil samples and took underwater photos and videos at maximum depth, illuminated only by its LED spotlight. During the current dive, Nereus' instruments recorded a depth of 10,902 meters. The indicator was 10,911 meters, and Picard and Walsh measured a value of 10,912 meters. Many Russian maps still show the value of 11,022 meters obtained by the Soviet oceanographic vessel Vityaz during the 1957 expedition. All this indicates the inaccuracy of the measurements, and not a real change in depth: no one carried out cross-calibration of the measuring equipment that gave the given values.
The Mariana Trench is formed by the boundaries of two tectonic plates: the colossal Pacific plate goes under the not so large Philippine plate. This is a zone of extremely high seismic activity, part of the so-called Pacific volcanic ring of fire, stretching for 40 thousand km, an area with the most frequent eruptions and earthquakes in the world. The deepest point of the trench is the Challenger Deep, named after the English ship.
The inexplicable and incomprehensible have always attracted people, which is why scientists around the world want to answer the question: “ What does the Mariana Trench hide in its depths??»
The inexplicable and incomprehensible have always attracted people
For a long time, oceanographers considered the hypothesis that life could exist at depths of more than 6,000 m in impenetrable darkness, under enormous pressure and at temperatures close to zero, to be crazy. However, the results of research by scientists in the Pacific Ocean have shown that even in these depths, much below the 6000-meter mark, there are huge colonies of living organisms, pogonophora, a type of marine invertebrate animals that live in long chitinous tubes open at both ends.
Recently, the veil of secrecy has been lifted by manned and automatic underwater vehicles made of heavy-duty materials, equipped with video cameras. The result was the discovery of a rich animal community consisting of both familiar and less familiar marine groups.
Thus, at depths of 6000 - 11000 km, the following were discovered:
- barophilic bacteria (developing only at high pressure);
- from protozoa - foraminifera (an order of protozoa of the subclass of rhizomes with a cytoplasmic body covered with a shell) and xenophyophores (barophilic bacteria from protozoa);
- from multicellular organisms - polychaete worms, isopods, amphipods, sea cucumbers, bivalves and gastropods.
At the depths there is no sunlight, no algae, constant salinity, low temperatures, an abundance of carbon dioxide, enormous hydrostatic pressure (increases by 1 atmosphere for every 10 meters). What do the inhabitants of the abyss eat?
Research has shown that there is life at depths of over 6,000 meters
The food sources of deep animals are bacteria, as well as the rain of “corpses” and organic detritus coming from above; deep animals are either blind, or with very developed eyes, often telescopic; many fish and cephalopods with photofluoride; in other forms the surface of the body or parts of it glow. Therefore, the appearance of these animals is as terrible and incredible as the conditions in which they live. Among them are frightening-looking worms 1.5 meters long, without a mouth or anus, mutant octopuses, unusual starfish and some soft-bodied creatures two meters long, which have not yet been identified at all.
Despite the fact that scientists have made a huge step in researching the Mariana Trench, the questions have not decreased, and new mysteries have appeared that have yet to be solved. And the ocean abyss knows how to keep its secrets. Will people be able to reveal them in the near future? We will follow the news.
