Three new species of snailfish were discovered at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.

 

In a multinational exploration, 40 scientists from 17 different nations explored the Atacama Trench running along the Pacific plate near Peru and Chile. This is one of the deepest places on earth, at a depth of 8,000 meters, running 6,000 km long.

 

Two lander devices, which were designed over the span of five years, took roughly four hours of free fall to reach the ocean floor, with cameras and traps attached to them. Once there, they carried out monitoring and sampling tasks, including recording with their HD cameras. After a certain amount of time, researchers sent a signal to the traps, releasing their weights and allowing them to float to the surface.

 

The landers are able to handle depths up to 11,000 meters, withstanding the very deepest parts of the ocean. They have already been used more than 200 times by scientists. In this expedition alone, the landers were deployed 27 times and recorded over 11,000 pictures and 100 hours of camera footage.

 

In some of this camera footage, three new species of fish are thought to be shown for the first time. These fish, temporarily nicknamed the Pink, Blue, and Purple Atacama Snailfish, have very interesting bodies. They are small, translucent, and lack scales.

 

“Their gelatinous structure means they are perfectly adapted to living at extreme pressure and in fact the hardest structures in their bodies are the bones in their inner ear which give them balance and their teeth. Without the extreme pressure and cold to support their bodies they are extremely fragile and melt rapidly when brought to the surface,” said Dr Thomas Linley, a researcher on the project from Newcastle University.

 

Due to their body structure and the extreme pressure and temperature that they are accustomed to, if the fish were to be brought to the surface they would seemingly “melt” and liquefy. However, scientists say they were able to catch and preserve one of these fish, which is being viewed by scientists from the United States and the United Kingdom.

 

The fish appeared to be at the top of the food chain at this extreme depth and seemed well fed.

 

Dr Linley continues, “There is something about the snailfish that allows them to adapt to living very deep. Beyond the reach of other fish they are free of competitors and predators. As the footage clearly shows, there are lots of invertebrate prey down there and the snailfish are the top predator, they seem to be quite active and look very well-fed.”

In addition to evidence of these new fish, rare footage of Munnopsids was also recorded. Munnopsids are isopods that have long legs roughly the size of a human hand. They swim backwards and upside-down before flipping over onto the sea floor when stationary.

“We don’t know what species of munnopsid these are but it’s incredible to have caught them in action in their natural habitat - especially the flip they do as they switch from swimming to walking mode,” said Dr Linley.