Water dating back 3 BILLION years may give us clues to the origins of life

Water dating back 3 BILLION years may give us clues to the origins of life, but it tastes 'terribly salty', says the scientist who tried it

• Professor Barbara Sherwood Lollar admitted to sipping the ancient water and described it as 'exceptionally salty with an orangy colour'
• Primeval pockets of water are like 'trapped time capsules' cut off from the Earth's surface for nearly billions of years, researchers say
• The similarity between the rocks in the mine and those on Mars raises the hope that similar life-sustaining water could exist on the nearby planet

By Rachel Reilly
PUBLISHED: 10:37 EST, 18 June 2013 | UPDATED: 04:47 EST, 19 June 2013
Groundwater found bubbling up from nearly two miles beneath the surface of Canada may predate the emergence of multicellular life, but it certainly doesn't taste great, a leading scientist has claimed.
A joint British and Canadian team discovered the ancient pockets of water, which they say are like 'trapped time capsules' cut off from the surface for as long as three billion years.
But Barbara Sherwood Lollar, an Earth sciences professor at the University of Toronto, who is studying the water, has described the water as tasting 'terrible' after feeling compelled to take a sip.
The water could be some of the oldest on the planet and may even contain life, the researchers claim, as it contains an abundance of chemicals known to support organisms in the absence of sunlight.

A joint British and Canadian team discovered the ancient pockets of groundwater in Canada, found bubbling up from nearly two miles beneath the surface. They have been described as like 'trapped time capsules' cut off from the surface for as long as three billion years

More exciting still, the similarity between the rocks that trapped it and those on Mars raises the hope that comparable life sustaining water could be locked deep beneath the surface of the Red Planet.
In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, she said that what jumps out at you first is the saltiness.
She said: 'Because of the reactions between the water and the rock, it is extremely salty. It is more viscous than tap water. It has the consistency of a very light maple syrup. It doesn't have colour when it comes out, but as soon as it comes into contact with oxygen it turns an orangy colour because the minerals in it begin to form — especially the iron.'
She added that 'you would definitely not want to drink this stuff'.

Professor Lollar explained that scientists are interested in the saltiest waters because they are the oldest, and tasting is the quick-and-dirty way to find which are the most salty.

She said she didn't let students indulge in the prehistoric tipple however.
Researchers from the universities of Manchester, Lancaster, Toronto and McMaster analysed the water which poured out of boreholes in a mine 7,875ft beneath Ontario, Canada.
'These are like trapped time capsules,' said Professor Lollar.
'They may tell us about the atmosphere 2.7 billion years ago, and about the fluids that formed the valuable ore deposits that are the foundation of Canada’s mineral wealth.'
Geochemical reactions with the rocks means the water contains dissolved hydrogen and methane, as well as noble gases like helium, neon, argon and xenon, that have been trapped since early in Earth’s history.

The water could be some of the oldest on the planet and may even contain life, the researchers claim, as it contains an abundance of chemicals known to support organisms in the absence of sunlight.

These gases could provide energy for microbes that may not have been exposed to the sun for billions of years, the researchers say.
Project leader Chris Ballentine, of the University of Manchester, said: 'Our finding is of huge interest to researchers who want to understand how microbes evolve in isolation, and is central to the whole question of the origin of life, the sustainability of life, and life in extreme environments and on other planets.'
Using ground-breaking techniques developed at the University of Manchester, the researchers say they have shown that the fluid is at least 1.5 billion years old, but could be significantly older.
It could even date back to the formation of the crystalline rocks surrounding the water, which are thought to be around 2.7billion years old - about half as old as the planet Earth itself.
Before this finding, the only water of this age was found trapped in tiny bubbles of rock, but the water found in the Canadian mine on the other hand pours from the rock at a rate of nearly two litres per minute.
It has similar characteristics to far younger water flowing from a mine 1.7 miles below ground in South Africa that was previously found to support microbes.
Dr Greg Holland of Lancaster University said: 'Our Canadian colleagues are trying to find out if the water contains life right now.
'What we can be sure of is that we have identified a way in which planets can create and preserve an environment friendly to microbial life for billions of years.'
Large regions of Mars are made up of terrain like that of the Earth’s Precambrian Shield – billions of years-old rocks with similar mineralogy.

'This shows that ancient rocks have the potential to support life and this could be the case whether they are three kilometres below the Earth’s surface or below the surface of Mars'

Barbra Sherwood Lollar, professor of geochemistry at the University of Toronto

 

Professor Sherwood Lollar said: 'The ancient waters of the Canadian Shield contain abundant chemicals that we know microbes can use as energy in the absence of sunlight-driven photosynthesis.
'This shows that ancient rocks have the potential to support life and this could be the case whether they are three km below the Earth’s surface or below the surface of Mars.'
The Canadian Shield discovery pushes the age of water much farther back than the South Africa discovery, identifying a groundwater system isolated from the surface for billions, rather than tens of millions of years.
'Our discovery establishes that ancient fluids, hitherto thought to have survived only in microscopic fluid inclusions trapped in the rocks, may instead still flow from ancient fractures,' said Professor Sherwood Lollar.

Watch a video of the water flowing from the rocks in the Canadian mine 

Subterranean sparkling water discovered

 

 

Professor Ballentine, who is based in Manchester’s School of Earth, Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, added: 'While the questions about life on Mars raised by our work are incredibly exciting, the ground-breaking techniques we have developed at Manchester to date ancient waters also provide a way to calculate how fast methane gas is produced in ancient rock systems globally.
'The same new techniques can be applied to characterise old, deep groundwater that may be a safe place to inject carbon dioxide.'
David Willetts, Minister for Universities and Science, said: 'This is excellent pioneering research. It gives new insight into our planet.
'It has also developed new technology for carbon capture and storage projects. These have the potential for growth, job creation and our environment.'
The findings were published today in the journal Nature.