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COURTESY OF PHOENIX IPY TEAM
EXTREME CHEMISTRY
Chemists working in extreme environments
mix SCIENCE WITH ADVENTURE
LINDA WANG, C&EN WASHINGTON
SHIVERING INSIDE a tent in an isolated
area of Antarctica, Tufts University professor
of chemistry Samuel P. Kounaves could
barely feel his fingers as he tried to keep the
solution in his pipette from freezing. Outside
the tent, the temperature was −30 ºC.
The barren, cracked land in these so-called
dry valleys looked eerily like Mars.
In fact, that’s the reason Kounaves and
colleagues embarked on this three-week
expedition in December 2007. They wanted
to do a trial run of analytical instruments
that would be taken to Mars by the Phoenix
Lander, and these dry valleys in Antarctica
are similar to some regions of the red planet.
“In chemistry, you think a lot of us just
want to be in the lab, but, in reality, I think
a lot of chemists are extroverts and they
enjoy going out into the world and doing
things,” Kounaves says. “We’re explorers
at heart.”
Kounaves isn’t alone in seeking answers
to scientific questions in such
extreme environments. As chemistry
becomes increasingly interdisciplinary,
chemists are finding more opportunities
to do fieldwork, which has traditionally
been the domain of researchers in the
natural sciences, in areas such as oceanography
and vulcanology. In this stormy job
market, the ability to work at the intersection
of multiple scientific disciplines and
to be imaginative about how chemistry
is applied to big-picture problems could
provide a safe haven.
Fieldwork can take many forms, from a
local half-day trip to a monthlong excursion
to the other side of the world. The
example of Kounaves and two other chemists
working on the far end of the spectrum
demonstrates that there’s no limit to what
chemists can do.
Tamsin A. Mather, an academic fellow
in the earth sciences department at the
University of Oxford, understands the
trials and tribulations of doing fieldwork
in extreme environments. She studies the
atmospheric chemistry of volcanic plumes
and their effects on the environment.
Mather says that the most extreme place
she’s worked in is Lascar Volcano, in the
Chilean Andes. What made it so challenging
for her team is the high altitude, which
MORE ONLINE
WWW.CEN-ONLINE.ORG 55 NOVEMBER 3, 2008
COLD ROOM
Inside a tent
in Antarctica,
Kounaves
analyzes
data on soil
samples.
made the climb to the
summit—while carrying
all their equipment—that
much more difficult. Not
only that, but the remotesensing
device they
had brought with them
stopped working. “You always
try to anticipate problems,” she says.
“But of course, things always occur that
you can’t anticipate.”
At the same time, Mather says she
wouldn’t trade the experience for the
world. “I feel privileged to be able to work
in some really beautiful places,” she says.
Mather has also studied the gas geochemistry
of volcanoes in Hawaii, Nicaragua,
and Italy.
IF RESEARCH atop volcanoes isn’t exciting
enough, imagine spending an entire
day in a tiny closet with two other people.
That’s what it feels like in the deep-sea
submersible Alvin, says George W. Luther
III, the Maxwell P. & Mildred H. Harrington
Professor of Oceanography at
the University of Delaware, who studies
sulfur and iron biogeochemistry at hydrothermal
vents.
Alvin’s chamber, essentially a titanium
ball that’s seven feet in diameter, is so small
that only one person can stand at a time.
The other two people have to be lying flat
in the ball, and sometimes their legs get
tangled, Luther says. What’s more, there
are no bathrooms, heating, or air conditioning.
“It’s exhausting going down in Alvin,”
says Luther of the daylong dives. “It’s
one of the most intense days of science
you’ll ever have in your life.”
Inside Alvin, a pilot navigates the submarine
to areas where hot chemicals are spewing
out of hydrothermal vents or farther
down the chimney where all the organisms
are. Using laptops that are wired through
the hull, Luther and the other scientists
collect data from sensors attached to the
outside of Alvin.
“Our goal is to try to understand the
chemistry that these organisms are living in
so we can better understand why they live
in the ecological niches that they live in,”
Luther says. “There’s an awful lot that we
don’t know about how they uptake chemicals
and perform their chemosynthesis.”
Luther’s research cruises have included
deep-sea expeditions in the Mediterranean
Experience what it feels like to sit in the passenger seat of
Alvin, a deep-sea submersible, at www.cen-online.org.