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Participant Interview:
June-July 2000
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NeMO Date: July 4, 2000
Ship's Location: 45 56.0'N/130 00.8'W

Use the Interview calendar at left for all Participant's perspectives.
 
         
         
 

Participant Interview:
Craig Moyer
Assistant Professor
Western Washington University

Jeff: What research are you conducting at Axial Volcano?
Craig: I'm studying the microbial ecology of the communities that are associated with the vents. I'm also comparing the new vent field communities from the eruption of '98 with the established vent communities at Ashes.

Jeff: What kind of differences are you looking for?
Craig: First and foremost is community diversity. I'm researching who are the dominant members of each of the microbial (bacteria and archaea) communities from the different habitats found down there.

Jeff: Why all the excitement about the bacteria and archaea at hydrothermal vents?
Craig: The microbes at hydrothermal vents use a completely different type of metabolic pathway than photosynthesis. They use smelly sulfur compounds and other minerals to make their living. This process, chemosynthesis, is completely exclusive of any kind of photosynthetic light source. In some ways they are uncoupled from the biology that exists up here. But in other ways, they are closely coupled because the majority of microbes at the vents are oxidizers. There's an energetic boost when oxygen is used for metabolism. The microorganisms in the subsurface floor, which are growing anaerobically (without oxygen), might be the only ones not relying on oxygen. These subsurface anaerobes can't produce nearly as much biomass as the aerobic ones near the vents. There are microbiologists investigating if there's photosynthesis at the vents from the infra-red region of the spectrum. Even if they are, it's not the main game in town. Photosynthetic microbes aren't the dominant geochemical movers and shakers down there at hydrothermal vents.

Jeff: What is the significance of your work to the field of science?
Craig: The impact on mankind could possibly be an industrial grade enzymatic process that could possibly be used for manufacturing antibiotics.

 

Craig Moyer with some of the bacterial traps used at Marker 33.