Hydrography and high-temperature heat flux of the Rainbow hydrothermal site (36°14′N, Mid-Atlantic Ridge)

Mineralogy, geochemistry and Nd isotope composition of the Rainbow hydrothermal field, Mid-Atlantic Ridge

Petrological, geochemical and Nd-isotopic analyses have been carried out on rock samples from the Rainbow vent field to assess the evolution of the hydrothermal system. The Rainbow vent field is an ultramafic-hosted hydrothermal system located on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, characterized by vigorous high-temperature venting (~365ºC) and unique chemical composition of fluids: high chlorinity, low pH...

Dominance of one bacterial phylotype at a Mid-Atlantic Ridge hydrothermal vent site.

Microbial community structure in natural environments has remained largely unexplored yet is generally considered to be complex. It is shown here that in a Mid-Atlantic Ridge hydrothermal vent habitat, where food webs depend on prokaryotic primary production, the surface microbial community consists largely of only one bacterial phylogenetic type (phylotype) as indicated by the dominance of a s...

High-Resolution 3D Simulations of Mid-ocean Ridge Hydrothermal Systems

Metals in the shell of Bathymodiolus azoricus from a hydrothermal vent site on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

Specimens of the mussel Bathymodiolus azoricus were collected from Menez Gwen, a relatively shallow (850 m) hydrothermal vent field on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Each bivalve shell (n = 21) was individually cleaned by selective chemical. The residual crystal matrix of each shell was individually analysed for the concentrations of the minor elements magnesium and strontium and the trace elements ir...

Bacterial diversity in hydrothermal sediment and epsilonproteobacterial dominance in experimental microcolonizers at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

We report here a molecular survey based on 16S rRNA genes of the bacterial diversity found in two deep-sea vent niches at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge: hydrothermal sediment (Rainbow site), and microcolonizers made of three different substrates (organic-rich, iron-rich and pumice) that were exposed for 15 days to a vent emission. Bacterial diversity in sediment samples was scattered through many bact...