【Watch The War of the World】

The Watch The War of the Worlddeep sea is awfully cryptic.

But scientists are making it less so.

A recent marine expedition to remote, previously unknown ocean caverns over 8,200 feet down revealed life thriving underneath hydrothermal vents — vents that emit hot, chemical-rich fluid into the water. This water, heated by the earth below, can support wild ocean ecosystems.

---

You May Also Like

---

---

Ocean researchers recently embarked on this 30-day voyage to the East Pacific Rise (off of Central America) aboard the ship Falkor (too), a vessel operated by the Schmidt Ocean Institute, an organization that researches the seas. It's the first time scientists successfully peered at what might lurk beneath hydrothermal vents.

"Using an underwater robot, the science team overturned chunks of volcanic crust, discovering cave systems teeming with worms, snails, and chemosynthetic bacteria living in 75 degrees Fahrenheit (25 degrees Celsius) water," the institute said in a statement. "The discovery adds a new dimension to hydrothermal vents, showing that their habitats exist both above and below the seafloor."

Mashable Light Speed Want more out-of-this world tech, space and science stories? Sign up for Mashable's weekly Light Speed newsletter. By clicking Sign Me Up, you confirm you are 16+ and agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Thanks for signing up!

SEE ALSO: Scientists discover ancient shark swimming in a really strange place

Here's a particularly interesting find: The scientists spotted creatures like tube worms "traveling underneath the seafloor through vent fluid to colonize new habitats." They're migrating through largely unknown passages.

"This truly remarkable discovery of a new ecosystem, hidden beneath another ecosystem, provides fresh evidence that life exists in incredible places," Schmidt Ocean Institute executive director Jyotika Virmani, an oceanographer, said in a statement. 

The underwater robot, ROV SuBastian, used a metal bar to pull up parts of the ocean crust and reveal small caverns teeming with life. Credit: ROV SuBastian / Schmidt Ocean Institute A colony of tubeworms on a vent system over 8,200 feet beneath the surface. Credit: ROV SuBastian / Schmidt Ocean Institute Deep sea tubeworm specimens colleced by the robot ROV SuBastian and brought back to the surface for study. Credit: Monika Naranjo / Schmidt Ocean Institute Mónika Naranjo-Shepherd / Schmidt Ocean Institute A curious-looking fish, an eelpout, swims past a colony of tubeworms at a hydrothermal vent site. Credit: ROV SuBastian / Schmidt Ocean Institute

The final image below shows an experiment — only made possible with a deep-sea robot — that proved life traveled beneath the ocean floor in this vent fluid. The robot glued mesh boxes over cracks on the seafloor, blocking entry. Days later, the robot removed the boxes. Animals, traveling through the subsurface, dwelled below.

---

Related Stories

---

• A dominant shark lurks in the deep, dark ocean. Meet the sixgill.
• There's a fascinating new clue to the giant megalodon's extinction
• Scientists find stunning new octopus world in the deep sea
• Amazing creature found 27,000 feet under the sea. Here's how it survives.
• Why the U.S. will get a whole lotta sea level rise

The mesh box experiment showing life travelled beneath the ocean floor. Credit: ROV SuBastian / Schmidt Ocean Institute

Deep sea exploration missions are vital. Scientists want to shine a light — literally and figuratively — on what's down there. The implications of knowing are incalculable, particularly as deep-sea mineral prospectors prepare to run tank-like industrial equipment across parts of the seafloor. For example, research expeditions have found that ocean life carries great potential for novel medicines. "Systematic searches for new drugs have shown that marine invertebrates produce more antibiotic, anti-cancer, and anti-inflammatory substances than any group of terrestrial organisms," notes the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

"Life exists in incredible places."

Want more scienceand tech news delivered straight to your inbox? Sign up for Mashable's Light Speed newslettertoday.

Stay tuned for more deep-sea discoveries. "We always discover stuff when we go out into the deep sea. You're always finding things that you haven't seen before," Derek Sowers, an expedition lead for NOAA Ocean Exploration, told Mashable last year.

• Social Good
• Shopping
• Science
• Digital Culture
• Life
• Games
• Entertainment
• Deals

• Total Cuomo Show
• Pour One Out for Branwell Brontë—the Guy Gets No Respect
• Madame Bovary’s Wedding Cake
• A New Museum Memorializes the Commercial World’s Biggest Failures
• Death of a Political Junkie
• Shakespeare: Dead for 401 Years and Still Getting Hate Mail
• Amazon iRobot deal: Save $200 on the iRobot Roomba i4
• Howard’s Way: An Oral History of Richard Howard
• The Vital Possibility of Abdul El-Sayed
• Airbnb now lists buildings that allow tenants to sublet their apartment short

• HTC's new flagship phone leaks two months early
• Android has gotten a lot safer in 2017, Google claims
• Google will ban all cryptocurrency ads this June
• 5 RSS apps to use now that Digg Reader is dead
• These images from the National School Walkout are powerful beyond belief
• Here's the first look at 'Westworld' Season 2 photos
• Biohacker with travel card chip in his arm fined for not having ticket
• People are sharing selfies from 2012 and now, because the glow up is too real
• 'Avengers: Infinity War': Where and what is the Soul Stone?
• Elizabeth Holmes, 'the next Steve Jobs,' charged with 'massive fraud'

• No Really, You Don’t Need a Weatherman
• Scorsese: Filmmakers Want “A Sense of Communion” with Viewers
• Got your Spotify Wrapped for 2022? Treat it like a shopping list and support artists directly.
• The Case of the Purloined Portrait
• Letter from Hong Kong
• Starting Out in the Evening
• Spotify Wrapped's mood descriptions are confusing the internet
• What is post
• Et tu, Boris?
• Once I Had This Dream: Gretchen Scherer’s Crumbling Chateaux

• Meat in the Machine
• Fun with Textiles: Samantha Bittman’s Woven Paintings
• A Memoir of Life at a Moving Company
• Spotify Wrapped 2022 is here to analyze your Listening Personality
• What the Doctors Ordered
• To Hölderlin (from Rilke with Love)
• Michael Chabon on Carsickness, Unsung Heroes of Pittsburgh Post
• 'The Marvels' did Aladna wrong
• The Vital Possibility of Abdul El-Sayed
• NYT's The Mini crossword answers for November 13