Scientists have discovered a new species in Utah’s Great Salt Lake that could change what is known about its ecosystem.
An investigation into the 950-square-mile body of water began when a University of Utah researcher saw a sign stating that only brine shrimp and flies can survive the extreme salt levels.
Believing the signage to be false because other creatures can thrive in similar ecosystems, the expert and his team began scouring sediment deposits and found a previously unknown species: thousands of tiny worms called nematodes.
Nematodes once populated the Great Salt Lake, but they were thought to be gone in 1985 when the lake bottom shrank and exposed them to the air.
The researcher’s findings not only prove that the lake’s ecosystem is more vibrant than previously thought, but because the lake’s waters have reached record levels, it shows the importance of healthy lake levels.
Mbioticites form when organisms such as algae and bacteria form a mat on the rock
Researchers from the University of Utah have found tiny worms living in a reef-like rock in the Great Salt Lake
Michael Werner, professor of biology and nematode expert, saw the sign during a walk in 2020 and immediately questioned it.
‘Nematodes are a virtually ubiquitous group of organisms that occur in a variety of environments. Some of those environments are very extreme,” he told local news KSL.com. ‘
So I thought, ‘Maybe no one was looking closely?’
Werner took his speculations to his colleagues who joined him on the mission to see if nematodes were indeed living in the extreme salt levels that are two to nine times saltier than the ocean’s three percent.
Together with his postdoctoral student Julie Jung, Werner crossed the lake, first by boat and then by bicycle, when the water level fell to a record low in 2022.
Werner told The Tribune that Jung had suggested that more nematodes might live in the microbial plants, a sedimentary deposit made of carbonate mud, before hitting the reef-like rock with a hammer.
“Julie had taken a hammer and was pulverizing a microbialite,” he said.
‘She found hundreds, and in some cases thousands, of worms. That really opened up the whole project for us.’
Mbioticites form when organisms such as algae and bacteria form a mat on the rock, giving it a slippery layer when you walk on it.
Nematodes are small worms that can live in extreme and harsh conditions
It attracts minerals from the water that build on existing rock structure and are often found along the fault lines and fissures in the outer areas of the Great Salt Lake.
These are compared to coral reefs in the ocean because they support lake life forms such as the brine flies that attach to the microbial plants as they grow into adults before floating to the surface.
Their appearance above water in turn serves as a food source for migrating waterfowl and shorebirds.
Werner and his team wanted to understand whether the microbial plants helped the nematodes survive or whether it was the other way around.
They conducted a test by feeding non-lake nematodes the bacteria from the microbial plants and exposing them to the salty lake water, along with a control group of non-lake nematodes fed only their usual diet of got mold.
The control group of worms was dead within 24 hours, while the nematodes that received the bacteria were still alive.
“It opened up a really exciting area of the ecology of what worms do in the lake,” Werner told the outlet.
‘Perhaps the nematodes also contribute to the formation of microbialites. … They may transport beneficial bacteria to other parts of the microbial fabric.”
More research needs to be done, but Werner hopes this can not only help understand how the Great Salt Lake ecosystem functions, but also shed light on how organisms survive on other planets, such as Mars, with extreme climate conditions.
“I think people look at the lake and hear it as some kind of smelly, lifeless place in our backyard, but it’s so much more than that,” Jung said. KSL.com.
‘The more you look, the more you find.’