life in earth’s primordial sea was starved for sulfate

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November 7, 2014

University of Faculty of Science British Columbia

Earths ancient oceans held much lower concentrations of sulfate -- akey biological nutrient -- than previously recognized, according to newresearch. The findings paint a new portrait of our planet's earlybiosphere and primitive marine life. Organisms require sulfur as anutrient, and it plays a central role in regulating atmospheric chemistryand global climate.

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Research vessel on Lake Matano, Indonesia. Sean Crowe, University of BritishColumbia.

arth's ancient oceans held much lower concentrations of sulfate -- akey biological nutrient -- than previously recognized, according toresearch published this week in Science.

The findings paint a new portrait of our planet's earlybiosphere and primitive marine life. Organisms requiresulfur as a nutrient, and it plays a central role inregulating atmospheric chemistry and global climate.

"Our findings are a fraction of previous estimates, andthousands of time lower than current seawater levels,"says Sean Crowe, a lead author of the study and anassistant professor in the Departments of Microbiologyand Immunology, and Earth, Ocean and AtmosphericSciences at the University of British Columbia.

"At these trace amounts, sulfate would have beenpoorly mixed and short-lived in the oceans -- and this sulfate scarcity would haveshaped the nature, activity and evolution of early life on Earth."

UBC, University of Southern Denmark, CalTech, University of Minnesota Duluth, and

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UBC, University of Southern Denmark, CalTech, University of Minnesota Duluth, andUniversity of Maryland researchers used new techniques and models to calibratefingerprints of bacterial sulfur metabolisms in Lake Matano, Indonesia -- a modern lakewith chemistry similar to Earth's early oceans.

Measuring these fingerprints in rocks older than 2.5 billion years, they discoveredsulfate 80 times lower than previously thought.

The more sensitive fingerprinting provides a powerful tool to search for sulfurmetabolisms deep in Earth's history or on other planets like Mars.

Findings

Previous research has suggested that Archean sulfate levels were as low as 200micromolar -- concentrations at which sulfur would still have been abundantly availableto early marine life.

The new results indicate levels were likely less than 2.5 micromolar, thousands oftimes lower than today.

What the researchers did

Researchers used state-of-the-art mass spectrometric approaches developed atCalifornia Institute of Technology to demonstrate that microorganisms fractionate sulfurisotopes at concentrations orders of magnitude lower than previously recognized.

They found that microbial sulfur metabolisms impart large fingerprints even whensulfate is scarce.

The team used the techniques on samples from Lake Matano, Indonesia -- a sulfate-poor modern analogue for the Earth's Archean oceans.

"New measurements in these unique modern environments allow us to use numericalmodels to reconstruct ancient ocean chemistry with unprecedented resolution" saysSergei Katsev an Associate Professor at the Large Lakes Observatory, University ofMinnesota Duluth.

Using models informed by sulfate isotope fractionation in Lake Matano, theyestablished a new calibration for sulfate isotope fractionation that is extensible to theEarth's oceans throughout history. The researchers then reconstructed Archeanseawater sulfate concentrations using these models and an exhaustive compilation ofsulfur isotope data from Archean sedimentary rocks.

Crowe initiated the research while a post-doctoral fellow with Donald Canfield at theUniversity of Southern Denmark.

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The above story is based on materials provided by University of Faculty of ScienceBritish Columbia. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

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University of Faculty of Science British Columbia. "Life in Earths primordial seawas starved for sulfate." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 7 November 2014..

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Journal Reference:

1. S. A. Crowe, G. Paris, S. Katsev, C. Jones, S.-T. Kim, A. L. Zerkle, S.Nomosatryo, D. A. Fowle, J. F. Adkins, A. L. Sessions, J. Farquhar, D. E.Canfield. Sulfate was a trace constituent of Archean seawater. Science, 2014;346 (6210): 735 DOI: 10.1126/science.1258966

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life in earth’s primordial sea was starved for sulfate

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