Deepest Ecosystem Ever Found: Chemosynthetic Communities Thrive in Hadal Trenches, Rewriting Carbon Cycle Models
Scientists using China's Fendouzhe submersible have discovered vast chemosynthetic ecosystems flourishing at unprecedented depths of 9,533 meters in the Kuril-Kamchatka and Aleutian Trenches. These communities, sustained by microbial methane production from organic sediments, span 2,500 km and challenge fundamental assumptions about life's limits and deep-ocean carbon sequestration.