Prehistoric ecosystem found in Israeli cave

Ripley Twenty-Nine

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Very cool.

Eight new species were discovered in this cave, all of them without eyes.

From the Article:
The cave was completely sealed off from the world, including from water and nutrients seeping through rock crevices above. Scientists who discovered the cave believe it has been intact for millions of years.

"Every species we examined had no eyes which means they lost their sight due to evolution," said Dimantman.
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Impossible to reconcile

That the discovery was made in Israel presents a whole set of unique anomalies for the religious jews there.

The government has to tread lightly with this type of discovery. A major component of the ruling coalition is SHAS party, and they are literal Torah-true believers. (The Bible is Truth). Since the world is just 6000 years old, according to Genesis, then this whole direction of scientific pursuit is rejected.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/721895.html
Not mentioned in the Reuters story:
These ancient animals found are still ALIVE. Not fossils.
 
Floyt said:
That is indeed amazingly cool! Kind of a terrestrial Black Smoker...
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If the system is entirely self-contained, what's the energy source? I'm thinking here of the farmer who raises pigs and chickens : he feeds the pigs on ◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊ and the chickens on pigshit.

The Haaretz piece mentions bacteria as the root of the feeding-chain, but what do they live on?
 
Such isolated cave or lavaflow ecosystems are not rare in Hawaii.
 
Dogdoctor said:
Such isolated cave or lavaflow ecosystems are not rare in Hawaii.
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Where you have vulcanism there's no shortage of energy-rich molecules. But what's the story with this cave? There's clearly rifting going on, the Jordan Valley and Dead Sea attest to that, so is there hydrogen-sulphide seeping up to power the system?

What's rare in Hawaii is anything that's been undisturbed for millions of years. Word-association throws up "new" and "active".
 
CapelDodger said:
Where you have vulcanism there's no shortage of energy-rich molecules. But what's the story with this cave? There's clearly rifting going on, the Jordan Valley and Dead Sea attest to that, so is there hydrogen-sulphide seeping up to power the system?

What's rare in Hawaii is anything that's been undisturbed for millions of years. Word-association throws up "new" and "active".
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More than rare I would say. Hawaii has an abundance of underground caves due to lava flows. Many of these are found in the construction of roads ect and often there are full of species (mostly blind) found only in that particular cave. Some of the organisms live in caves and come out through lava tubes and spread to other caves (not isolated). In addition they have small amounts of vegetation that develop like little islands in lava flows above ground in which species develop that are only found on that little patch of vegetation. Evolution in action.
 
webfusion said:
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/721895.html
Not mentioned in the Reuters story:
These ancient animals found are still ALIVE. Not fossils.
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Thanks for this article. The issue is fascinating but I was confused by this statement in the original article:

The cave was completely sealed off from the world, including from water and nutrients seeping through rock crevices above.
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The second article has the above quotation too but also says:
The underground cave includes an underground lake, in which the crustaceans were found. The lake is part of the Yarkon-Taninim aquifer, one of Israel's two aquifers, yet is different in temperature and chemical composition from the main waters of the aquifer. The lake's temperature and salinity indicates that its source is deep underground.
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So the cave wasn't totally cut off from the world since the lake was feed from the aquifer. I was trying to figure out how, if the cave was totally sealed off from water, that these species could live there. Are there any invertebrates that can survive totally without water? I thought that was impossible but I don't really know.
 
supercorgi said:
*snip* Are there any invertebrates that can survive totally without water? I thought that was impossible but I don't really know.
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Other than certain in-laws (who seem to subsist mainly on gin) I am not aware of any.
 
webfusion wroter:
... (The Bible is Truth). Since the world is just 6000 years old, according to Genesis, then this whole direction of scientific pursuit is rejected.
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I wondered whether some Jews might not have calculated an age for the earth in the way that has been done by Christians to come up with the 6000 year figure. I did a google search on the phrase "torah is true" to see what I could find on this. I didn't find anything that went to a 6000 year old earth calcualtion but a quick search turns up quite a variety of sites. The first site listed was for a Jews against Zionism group.

I realize the above was a digression and my apologies for that. I was interested in the topic of the opening post, it just seems that so far there is very little information available about it, even to the point of exactly what isolated means. It seems clear that some water from outside the system must be entering it and presumably some water must be exiting the system.
 
Does the mere fact that it was discovered and samples taken render this cave contaminated and therefore not long for this Earth? To get samples something must have gone in and with it contaminants. I'm thinking to last this long completely isolated it must have had a very delicate balance.

I wonder how many more "caves" are out there...


edited to add: I still think finds like this are absolutely fascinating!
 
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Starthinker said:
Does the mere fact that it was discovered and samples taken render this cave contaminated and therefore not long for this Earth? To get samples something must have gone in and with it contaminants. I'm thinking to last this long completely isolated it must have had a very delicate balance.
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It has probably developed a very robust balance. All of the species down there, animal or microbial, have evolved to be expert exploiters of that particular environment. Interlopers have no chance. They may be more sophisticated, but they won't be nearly as focused.
 
Starthinker said:
I wonder how many more "caves" are out there...
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I recall visiting tourist traps in the midwest that had underground caves with rivers and white blind fish. No need for eyes or protective coloration in the pitch black!

It is cool. I'm curious as to whether their other senses are better developed so that they can find food and avoid predators.
 
Huntsman said:
CapelDodger:

There are species of bacteria that feed on rocks and soil. THese could form a basis for the energy supply.
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Soil has organic material which can be broken down to obtain energy, but in a closed system that energy will be dissipated. In normal soil it's replenished by photosynthesis. Rocks can be eaten for nutrients, but not for energy. There has to be an energy flow into the system, thermodynamics demands it. Via hydrogen-sulphide or carbon monoxide or something.

The idea that it's part of an aquifer when it has a distinct chemistry and temperature strikes me as questionable. If that's the equilibrium state something very peculiar, and continuous, is happening in that location.
 
Shera said:
I recall visiting tourist traps in the midwest that had underground caves with rivers and white blind fish. No need for eyes or protective coloration in the pitch black!
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Eyes, with all the neural back-office, are a major investment and if there's no pay-back they get shut down first in a challenging environment. In Dogdoctors Hawaii the isolated communities have been isolated pretty recently and the first thing selected against is eyesight


It is cool. I'm curious as to whether their other senses are better developed so that they can find food and avoid predators.
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The sense that links us to our earliest ancestors is the sense of smell. The earliest proto-cell could not prosper if it couldn't sense, react to, and exploit its chemical environment. The sense of smell is simply an extension of that. Primates like us have exploited the new technology of sight - and hearing - at the expense of the primeval. But we have dogs to do the nose-thing for us.
 
bjb said:
Here's an updated story:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060601/ap_on_sc/israel_lost_world

When one of the volunteer staff crouched down to measure the temperature of the warm, sulfuric water he suddenly jumped up and yelled "there is something moving here."

The bacteria could be feeding off hydrogen sulphide.
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Yes, if there is sulphur available, then this is not new, bio-chemically. But it is another reminder that we do not know what creeps and crawls on this planet. They could still discover another ape/hominin living somewhere particularly obscure.....
 
Frumkin said similar caves have been discovered in Romania and Mexico, but none were as isolated. Unlike most animals, which depend on the photosynthesis food chain, the newly discovered species live off a completely independent and self-sustaining ecosystem.
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Wow, so it really sounds like the claim is that this is a completely isolated ecosystem. It seems plausible but I am a tad skeptical.

Has there ever been a discovery like this before? I realize that there are ecosystems that don't depend on photosynthesis in the deep ocean, but they aren't isolated. I am also awhere of the glass globes that they sell with a few species including I think a small shrimp that can live a long time in isolation from the overall ecosystem. Does anybody know what the oldest of these is where the creatures are still alive? I wouldn't have guessed that even with perfect light and temperature environment these things would have kept going for 5 million years.

I took a shot of creating one of my own little closed ecosystems. I put some aquatic snails, a few plants and some algae into a glass jar. The snails died within several months and I don't think they ever succeeded in laying eggs. Something was not happy with my little experiment for the snails.

It just seems really tough to maintain the chemical balances necessary for life in a closed system. But maybe its easier than I realized.
 
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