Cuatro Ciénegas, corals and calcium

This morning my good friend Mónica Medina stopped by my office to discuss the decalcification of marine creatures as the pH of the ocean decreases. (You know how acid dissolves hard water deposits?  It does the same thing to the shells of little creatures too.)  She researches marine life and I do experimental evolution so perhaps we can figure out how much marine organisms can evolve to become resistant to acid....it seems like it's worth a try anyway.  

Apparently all deep sea corals are expected to be extinct within the next decade.  (I hope not. Evolution really does make some organisms robust against change across generations, but it has some  limitations too.)  They will have to make it on their own if they make it because the sediments of the next decade are already on their way down.  But there are a lot of organisms besides deep sea corals that depend on calcium deposits as well though.  Maybe we can do something about those.  

There is a place in Mexico called Cuatro Ciénegas.  It is an oasis in the desert that is home to 150 plant and animal species unique to the area.   The bacteria present are also unique.  About half of the bacterial species found at Cuatro Ciénegas are more closely related to bacteria found in the ocean than to any other bacteria even though they have been separated for millions of years.  Many of the bacteria at Cuatro Ciénegas deposit calcium.  The danger presented to those organisms however is not decreasing pH, but decreasing water levels.  The aquifers that feed the oasis also feed the surrounding farmlands.  As the farming in the area has increased, the water levels seem to have decreased.  However, water pipelines are being brought in from the mountains and they certainly help the farmers and may help Cuatro Ciénegas.

NASA has identified Cuatro Ciénegas as a place to study life on Mars because the conditions are apparently similar to Mars and the kinds of microorganisms found there might be similar to those that would have been able to live on Mars.  NASA also funds scientists to study how agricultural plants would grow on Mars and to figure out survival strategies for living on Mars.

 When I read about stuff like this it feels really strange to be a scientist.  Mónica is bracing herself against the day when all of the corals are gone and trying to find ways of preventing it.  I am trying to find ways to keep humanity from being wiped out by a disease, and NASA is trying to find ways of living places other than Earth.  It all seems like something from a Ray Bradbury story.  I grew up reading Ray Bradbury books and they are NOT why I became a scientist.  Still, sometimes it feels a little cool to feel like I am a small part of one of his stories.  I am glad he almost always had an amount of hope in them.  I think that hope is why I became an evolutionary biologist.  It always gives me hope to see how life manages to persist. It's also really fun to try to outsmart bacteria when they are so frustratingly good at surviving no matter what we do to them.