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posted by azrael on Saturday August 02 2014, @06:09AM   Printer-friendly
from the except-that-bit-I-don't-want-that-bit dept.

A report from Phys.org explains that a Florida State University researcher found that bacteria in the Gulf of Mexico consumed many of the toxic components of the oil released during the Deepwater Horizon spill in the months after the spill, but not the most toxic contaminants.

In two new studies conducted in a deep sea plume, Assistant Professor Olivia Mason found a species of bacteria called Colwellia likely consumed gaseous hydrocarbons and perhaps benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylene compounds that were released as part of the oil spill. But, her research also showed that bacteria did not consume the most toxic parts of the oil spill in the water column plume or in the oil that settled on the seafloor.

The most toxic contaminants are called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons or PAHs. PAHs are a group of semi-volatile organic compounds that are present in crude oil and can cause long-term health problems such as cancer.

"Those PAHs could persist for a long time, particularly if they are buried in the ocean floor where lack of oxygen would slow PAH degradation by microorganisms," Mason said. "They're going to persist in the environment and have deleterious effects on whatever is living in the sediment."

The full research paper is here.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 02 2014, @06:54AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 02 2014, @06:54AM (#76667)
    Many conservatives are loose cannons who ruin the earth wherever there is money to be made. They do so because they believe that god will rescue them from their own doing [pbs.org] if their disasters get too large or too fatal. I bet that they were counting on him to fix the Deepwater Horizon spill for them [roadsfromemmaus.org], but unsurprisingly, god has failed to deliver a deus ex machina [nwchurch.org]. Science most likely has a solution in store, but for that we need to fund it...
    • (Score: 2) by jasassin on Saturday August 02 2014, @08:41AM

      by jasassin (3566) <jasassin@gmail.com> on Saturday August 02 2014, @08:41AM (#76683) Homepage Journal

      I've been watching too much Twilight Zone. Its like an episode of self fulfilling prophecy. Only when this last one is standing barely alive in a world of grey mud, and the only stars in the sky a constellation in the shape of their own face will realization set in.

      --
      jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A
  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Reziac on Saturday August 02 2014, @07:33PM

    by Reziac (2489) on Saturday August 02 2014, @07:33PM (#76759) Homepage

    Natural sources are an estimated 40% of oil contamination in the oceans. Well, the seeps we KNOW of. There are probably a lot of deep-water seeps we DON'T know about. A few starter links:

    http://www.whoi.edu/oilinocean/page.do?pid=51880 [whoi.edu]
    http://www.livescience.com/5422-natural-oil-spills-surprising-amount-seeps-sea.html [livescience.com]
    http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/03/140325-texas-pollution-oil-spills-animals-science/ [nationalgeographic.com]

    --
    And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
    • (Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday August 02 2014, @08:37PM

      by frojack (1554) on Saturday August 02 2014, @08:37PM (#76766) Journal

      It is interesting that a spill of this size happening somewhere else could have had far worse effects than happened in the gulf.

      Because wide spread seeps in the gulf have been happening for millenniums, those bacteria were well established to handle sudden spills by blooming very rapidly, astounding virtually every expert in the field. This didn't happen in Alaskan waters [citylab.com] where seeps are virtually unheard of.

      As for the PHAs they too have been in the gulf for millenniums from the same natural sources. Given the eons that the seeps have been seeping, and PHAs have been accumulating and being buried in the sea floor would exceed by orders of magnitude what this spill created.

      So where are these naturally accumulating deposits?

      Are they simply deeper than than these scientists looked in their analysis of only 64 samples immediately adjacent to the wellhead? Did they look elsewhere?

      Or, are they simply sampling too soon? April 2010 was barely over 4 years ago for pete sake, a mere eyeblink in geologic time.

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
      • (Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday August 02 2014, @10:10PM

        by Reziac (2489) on Saturday August 02 2014, @10:10PM (#76781) Homepage

        All good points. Leaping to premature conclusions is not going to help a spill. Rather, studying "where the hell did it go?"

        --
        And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.