\n
\n
![\"EarthSnap\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/1766790432_598_earthsnap-banner-news.webp.webp\")
\n<\/a><\/p>\n
Between stacked lava flows on the Belcher Islands in Hudson Bay, Canada, fractured volcanic glass preserves these trails within rocks altered by ancient hydrothermal activity.<\/p>\n
Analyzing those formations, Dominic Papineau at the Institute of Deep-sea Science and Engineering (IDSSE<\/a>) documented the trails alongside minerals that record biological interaction with the glass.<\/p>\n Each trail consists of tightly grouped, similarly sized spheres linked by organic material \u2013 a pattern consistent with coordinated microbial behavior rather than random mineral growth.<\/p>\n Because these traces occur within chemically altered vent deposits, the setting itself constrains how the features formed and points toward a biological origin that demands closer comparison with other structures in the rock.<\/p>\n What the trails mean<\/p>\n Researchers call the trails ichnofossils, marks left by life rather than body remains, because the rock<\/a> preserves behavior instead of actual bodies.<\/p>\n Around the spherical traces, Papineau found the phosphate-rich mineral apatite and iron compounds that fit with microbes dissolving the glass.<\/p>\n \u201cTrails of spheroidal ichnofossils composed of titanite and organic matter surround abundant nanoscopic-size apatite and lepidocrocite,\u201d wrote Papineau.<\/p>\n That arrangement points toward active nutrient hunting, not passive mineral growth.<\/p>\n Size starts to matter<\/p>\n Most of the round traces were extremely small, measuring just a few thousandths of an inch across.<\/p>\n A narrow spread matters because living cells often cluster around repeatable sizes, while many nonliving mineral<\/a> features vary much more.<\/p>\n Strings of similar spheres also differ from larger mineral bubbles in the same rock, which were filled with a common rock mineral called calcite, a form of calcium carbonate.<\/p>\n That does not settle the case alone, but it makes a random growth story less convincing than before.<\/p>\n A second form of evidence<\/p>\n Elsewhere in the same rocks, straight tubes ran side by side, giving the evidence a second, distinct form.<\/p>\n Those tubes held titanite, a calcium titanium mineral, around carbon-rich residue, yet most lacked the nearby phosphate signal.<\/p>\n Because no tube ended in a trapped crystal, the shapes look less like scratches carved by wandering grains.<\/p>\n That split between spheres and tubes suggests more than one biological process, and possibly more than one stage of preservation.<\/p>\n Potential for chemically active fluids<\/p>\n The rocks formed near shallow seafloor vents, not in a quiet mud plain far from volcanic activity.<\/p>\n Rocky spires, rust-colored mineral patches, and hardened surface layers all point to hot, chemically active fluids moving through the area.<\/p>\n Such places can trap phosphorus and iron in fresh glass<\/a>, and then keep replacing minerals as water moves through cracks.<\/p>\n That setting helps explain how microbes could find both chemical energy and a rock soft enough to alter.<\/p>\n Chemical signatures of living organisms <\/p>\n Carbon and sulfur isotopes, heavier and lighter versions of the same elements, add another layer to the case.<\/p>\n Some of the material contained noticeable amounts of carbon, and its chemical signature showed it likely came from living organisms.<\/p>\n \u201cStable isotopes provide complementary biosignatures for possible chemolithotrophy,\u201d wrote Papineau.<\/p>\n Those depleted values fit chemolithotrophic life, microbes drawing energy from rock and dissolved chemicals instead of sunlight.<\/p>\n Chemical changes after burial<\/p>\n Some patterns in these rocks probably formed after burial, when decaying biomass and minerals reacted without living cells.<\/p>\n Papineau links those rounded and layered forms to diagenesis, chemical change during burial, rather than to active tunneling.<\/p>\n Similar carbon swings also echo the Shunga-Francevillian Event<\/a>, which marked major oxidation after Earth\u2019s early oxygen rise.<\/p>\n By separating these later reactions from the trails, the paper avoids treating every strange texture as a fossil.<\/p>\n Why the debate persisted<\/p>\n Claims like this have drawn skepticism for decades because ancient traces<\/a> in volcanic glass can be mimicked by later mineral changes.<\/p>\n Earlier work<\/a> on modern oceanic glass showed that microbes can etch similar textures, giving this case a living analogue.<\/p>\n This rock formation, called the Flaherty Formation, stands out because the shapes, surrounding minerals, and chemical signals all line up inside the same vent-altered deposits.<\/p>\n That convergence does not erase uncertainty, but it raises the bar for any purely nonliving explanation.<\/p>\n Broader implications of the research <\/p>\n Volcanic glass is common on Earth and beyond it, so this work reaches past one set of Canadian rocks.<\/p>\n Impact glass has already been discussed<\/a> as a target in the search for ancient life on Mars.<\/p>\n The paper also suggests future searches should look for clusters of clues, not single shapes taken in isolation.<\/p>\n That advice matters on other worlds and in Earth\u2019s oldest rocks alike, where false positives can waste years.<\/p>\n Across one battered vent system, the new picture is of microbes that modified volcanic glass, scavenged scarce phosphorus, and left overlapping biosignatures.<\/p>\n Modern seafloor comparisons should test that idea further, but the Flaherty rocks now look far more alive than accidental.<\/p>\n The study is published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u2014\u2013<\/p>\n Like what you read?\u00a0Subscribe to our newsletter<\/a>\u00a0for engaging articles, exclusive content, and the latest updates.<\/p>\n Check us out on\u00a0EarthSnap<\/a>, a free app brought to you by\u00a0Eric Ralls<\/a>\u00a0and Earth.com.<\/p>\n \u2014\u2013<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Scientists have identified microscopic trails in ancient volcanic glass as fossil traces left by microbes that burrowed into…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":376817,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[85,46,141],"class_list":{"0":"post-376816","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-science","8":"tag-il","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-science"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=376816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/376816\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/376817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=376816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=376816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=376816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}