Scientists find new virus at depths of Pacific Ocean

A team of scientists from China and Australia exploring the Pacific Ocean have stumbled upon a new type of virus 8.9 kilometres below sea level.

They found the virus in sediments taken from the Mariana Trench in the western Pacific Ocean.

According to the scientists, the virus is part of a previously unidentified family of viruses that’s distributed throughout the oceans, which the team is calling Suviridae (or ‘Siphoviruses’).

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It’s also a bacteriophage, which means that this virus uses bacteria to make more of itself and cannot make humans its host. They have named this bacteriophage ‘vB_HmeY_H4907’.

The virus was found in the hadal zone, the deepest part of the ocean from 6km to 11km below sea level.

The team’s findings were published on Wednesday in the journal Microbiology Spectrum.

'Virus is known to affect bacteria only'

“The hadal trench is the planet’s least explored and the most mysterious environment, and it is the deepest habitat for life on Earth’s surface,” said study author Min Wang, a virologist at the Ocean University of China, in a statement from the American Society for Microbiology, publishers of the journal.

“Our understanding of hadal viruses has been greatly limited by the scarcity of isolated viruses in the hadal trenches.”

“This study reported the discovery of a temperate phage…isolated from surface sediment from the Mariana Trench at a depth of 8,900 metres. To our best knowledge, it is the deepest isolated siphovirus from the ocean.”

The virus is said to specifically target Halomonas bacteria, a group of bacteria known to live in deep-seaenvironments and near hydrothermal vents.

Team intends to find more viruses

However, it is believed that the pair have a relatively friendly relationship. The scientists said that the virus is genetically similar to its host and is a lysogenic phage, meaning that it inserts its genetic material into the bacteria but usually doesn’t kill it; instead, both virus and bacteria replicate at the same time.

The researchers theorize that vB_HmeY_H4907 might have co-evolved with these bacteria to ensure its survival in harsh conditions.

The scientists said that they are planning to further study the interactions between deep sea phages and their hosts on a molecular level, adding that they will keep looking for more strange viruses in the most inhospitable places on the planet.

“Extreme environments offer optimal prospects for unearthing novel viruses,” said Wang.

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