The Lechuguilla Cave in south-eastern New Mexico (you can see a photo of part of it in the first slide) is the second deepest in the US (at 1,604 feet), and it runs underground for 150 miles. Located in the Carlsbad Caverns National Park, the cave isn’t open to regular visitors because it includes an extremely fragile ecosystem. And in 2019, a team of explorers discovered a new pool of water that had never been seen by humans.
The Lechuguilla Caves preserve an enormous variety of formations caused by mineral deposits over time. The pool of water featured in the second photo — the recently discovered one — isn’t milky white, but completely clear (the photo angle makes it look different), and contains an extremely rare environment free of human contaminants (including human microorganisms).
Because the Lechuguilla Cave is between four and six million years old, and because it is so deep underground, bacteria evolved there that aren’t found on the earth’s surface. The microorganisms survive by metabolizing carbon dioxide and trace minerals like sulphur, iron, and manganese.
In a 2016 paper in _Nature_, scientists reported discovering that some of the bacteria in the cave system is hyper-resistant to antibiotics. This makes it especially important to control human interaction so that these species don’t escape and cause damage. But it’s also very interesting because these bacteria evolved their antibiotic resistance not because of our human overuse of antibiotics, but for some other reason — likely, the “extreme isolation and fierce competition for the scarce nutrients in the cave system”.
Field trip, anyone? 🤓
Sources: Spookygeology.com, “Discovery of weird water pool in Lechuguilla Cave,” June 6, 2020, by Themeansar. www.archaeologust.org “Fantastic ‘Virgin’ Pool Never Before Seen by Humans Discovered Deep in New Mexico Cave”, Jan 20, 2023.
