ナショナルジオグラフィックさんのインスタグラム写真 - (ナショナルジオグラフィックInstagram)「Photos by @laurentballesta | A volcano can destroy everything in a second, but marine life has eternity to rebuild its realm. In March 2021, a team of divers and I explored an area nicknamed the “Valley of the 200 Volcanoes” (photo 1), located in the Mediterranean Sea between the Aeolian islands of Panarea and Stromboli, north of Sicily, Italy. The goal was to retrieve water and gas samples for science, but for me there was another challenge: to find life in the chaos. If approaching a volcano is dangerous, how about diving around it? Hot gases subsided and chimneys of crystallized iron oxides—some reaching 13 feet high—disintegrated almost at sight. Yet amid such harsh conditions, there was life: a daring flatworm venturing to the top of a spitting hydrothermal vent (2); a giant vertebrate shaped like a crystal bell, called Clavelina dellavallei (3); a sea star found lying amid barren black rubble (4). At Panarea (5), where we first anchored, the waters were shallow and acidic, bubbling from the bottom up. Only anaerobic bacteria (6), which do not need oxygen to survive, appeared to flourish. On rocky walls, they formed a thick felt covering that gently undulated under acidic caresses. At 250 feet, the landscape looked Martian red, ochre, yellow. But unlike the red planet, this forbidding place was alive, as if suffocating from excess activity. Gas and hot water escaped from the tops of narrow chimneys formed over thousands of years. At Stromboli, whose smoking summit can be seen from a distance (7), the scenery underwater was only black sand and jagged stones, but pioneering species had begun their work of reclaiming the area. Though not pictured, nearby in a field of white gorgonian coral half-buried in the remnants of a recent lava flow, an eight-inch juvenile dogfish cruised by. This young shark, whose fate is uncertain, is a perfect symbol of a reborn ecosystem. Read the full story at the link in bio. #WorldOceansDay」6月9日 3時34分