• Question: How can carbon survive at the bottom of the ocean

    Asked by luckylaura to Carol on 28 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Carol White

      Carol White answered on 28 Jun 2012:

      Good question luckylaura!

      There are lots of ways to get carbon on the sea floor – it could be bits of dead trees, leaves, soils, or animals that have sunk there.

      But how does it stay as carbon and not get changed into something else or dissolved into the water….?

      Lots of scientists have been working on this area of science, but the simple answer is – it get’s buried! As more layers of sediment or grains arrive on top of the carbon it’s buried away, safe from chemical changes.

      My work looks another way that it might not survive… when animals on the sea floor dig it back up. The worms in my experiments bury themselves into the sediments, find the carbon and eat it. So it’s not safe from worms! But when the worms die, if they get buried away, then that counts as carbon being buried away!

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