Scientists exploring a marine trench(海沟) near Japan were surprised to find a type of snailfish in one of the deepest parts of the ocean, at 8, 336 meters below the surface. The creature is probably the deepest fish anyone will ever find.
“They can’t really go any deeper,” says deep-sea scientist Alan Jamieson of the University of West Australia, who led the team that made the discovery, considering the theoretical limit of fish physiology(生理机能) is around 8, 400 meters to ensure that fish cells don’t become too small at such enormous pressures. “If anyone does find fish deeper than this, it will not be by much,” Jamieson says. The previous record holder, a junior snail fish seen in the Mariana Trench, was filmed at a depth of 8, 178 meters in 2017.
Prosanta Chakrabarty, director of fishes at Louisiana State University’s Museum of Natural Science, is impressed that the fish could survive so far down, where the water pressure is 800tes that of the surface. “At that depth, everything from gas exchange for breathing to nearly every physiological function seems impossible,” he says. “I can barely swim to the bottom of a swimming pool without my ears exploding.”
Jamieson’s team discovered the snail fish in August 2022 at the bottom of the Izu-Ogasawara Trench, near the main islands of Japan. To explore deep ocean trenches, the team was using manned and unmanned underwater vehicles equipped with cameras, lights and batteries, along with a weight to carry the equipment to the seafloor, unexpectedly photographing the fish.
The warmer water seems to be why the snail fish survive. These snail fish are living near the edge of what’s possible. “The difference is less than a degree, so we wouldn’t care,” Jamieson says. “But it makes a difference to sea animals.”
In an e-mail to Scientific American, Dahiana Arcila, a scientist who studies fishes noted the part played by technology in the discovery. “Detectors and landers will gain a deeper understanding of the unexplored regions of our planet’s oceans,” she wrote.
【小题1】What can we learn from the first paragraph?| A．The snail fish is native to the marine trench. |
| B．The finding is within the expectations of the scientist. |
| C．It was the Japanese scientists that conducted the exploration. |
| D．The fish maybe the deepest one in the ocean now and forever. |
| A．They both made record-breaking discoveries. |
| B．They both used manned and unmanned vehicles. |
| C．They both expanded the limit of fish physiology. |
| D．They both found snail fish at a depth of 8, 400 metres. |
| A．Concerned. | B．Confused. | C．Surprised. | D．Disappointed. |
| A．To emphasize the necessity of marine exploration. |
| B．To encourage a deeper exploration of unknown oceans. |
| C．To stress the role of advanced technology in the research. |
| D．To confirm the importance of the discovery to our planet. |
