2023-07-07 19:09:00
Their most singular reddish color has earned them the nickname of “Blood Falls” or “blood waterfalls”. Located in the McMurdo Dry Valleys, these spring from the Taylor Glacier, which is in Antarctica.
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For a long time, the color of these glacial waterfalls, discovered in 1911 during a British expedition, remained a mystery.
However, Ken JT Livi, a researcher at Johns-Hopkins University – located in Baltimore, Maryland (United States) – thinks he has solved the mystery up to date. The scientist took part in an investigation, the conclusions of which were published at the end of May in Astronomy and Space Sciencebefore being recently relayed on the website of the higher education institution.
Using powerful electron microscopes, Ken JT Livi and his colleagues closely studied water samples taken from Blood Falls. Their research enabled them to determine that this liquid was particularly rich in iron particles, as indicated in a press release relayed by several media.
Solved: Using the powerful transmission electron microscopes of our Materials Characterization and Processing facility, Hopkins Engineer Ken Livi found the iron-rich nanospheres responsible for Antarctica’s “Blood Falls.” https://t.co/pDmJeZb76w
— Johns Hopkins Engineering (@HopkinsEngineer) June 26, 2023
Very special characteristics
Specifically, they are “rich nanospheres” that make water look bloody following oxidizing. This one is clear as it comes out of the glacier. It is then, in a second time, that it is tinted with a blood red color.
In their report, the researchers said that the nanospheres were very small, being regarding 100th the size of an average human red blood cell. In addition, they have specific chemical and physical characteristics.
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In said press release, Ken JT Livi spoke at length on this subject. “I noticed these nanospheres […] laugh at ithe detailed. They contained many elements, [dont] du silicon, du calcium, de l’aluminium et du sodium.”
The researchers went in search of minerals
In the same context, Ken JT Livi then indicated that these nanospheres came from ancestral microbes, which are found in the melting waters of the glacier. According to him, due to their extremely small size, these particles escaped the vigilance of other scientists who, in the past, had investigated regarding this red color.
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On the other hand, Ken JT Livi also recalled that his colleagues had assumed that the color of the water was caused by minerals. For this reason, they had concentrated their investigations on the search for this type of elements in the water. However, nanospheres are not minerals.
“To be a mineral, the atoms must be arranged in a very specific crystal structure.summarized Ken JT Livi, quoted in the same press release. These nanospheres are not crystalline, [alors] methods previously used to examine solids did not detect them.”
On the same topic :
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