CARBON 1: VULCANO
The Baia de Levante is a bay like no other — nestled next to the Aeolian island of Vulcano, it boasts one of the only characterized shallow carbon seeps in the world — a gradient of dissolved carbon dioxide that originates from extremely low pH, volcanic seeps.
Venting carbon fills the water, creating a rare ecosystem containing all manner of unexplored life.
If naturally evolved, hyper-efficient carbon capture microbes exist on Earth, they will be places like this.
In September `22, we successfully executed a field mission to Vulcano. The expedition was co-led collaboration with researchers (and 2FP members) from the University of Palermo as well as local authorities from Vulcano; the work would not have been possible without their help.
Our dive team collected samples along the entire gradient from high-carbon dioxide to low-carbon dioxide seawater and immediately prepared them in our field lab for a paired DNA sequencing and culturing experiments, which we will use to characterize and utilize the evolution of life along a dissolved carbon gradient.
We (in both Italy and in the United States) are currently in the process of culturing novel carbon-capturing organisms from these samples and, from our isolates, building a living database for use by the scientific community.