T

he US-RI joint deep sea exploration conducted in North Sulawesi’s Sangihe-Talaud waters has found that the West Kawio volcanic sea mount is the navel of the submarine ecosystem in the area.

Indonesia Research Body for Fisheries and Marine researcher Sugiarta Wirasantosa said the exploration project had been able to take photos and carry out sea floor mapping of the underwater geological features. The team found five or six sea mounts during the exploration, with the largest being the volcano, whose summit was found at a depth of 1,900 meters and its base at a depth of 5,200 meters.

“Some 3,300 meters of Mount West Kawio are beneath the sea, and it actively emits minerals and volcanic gases. From its perfect cone shape, we can conclude it has never erupted,” Sugiarta said over the weekend.

Sangihe Islands and Talaud Islands are two regencies of North Sulawesi province, located at the tip of Indonesia’s northern most border with the Philippines.

The two-month exploration, dubbed Index Satal (Indonesian Exploration Sangihe-Talaud), was carried out by Okeanos Explorer of the US National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which took the deep sea photos, and Indonesia’s Baruna Jaya IV, which took shallow sea water samples. As both countries have wide ocean areas, Index Satal 2010 is part of a long-term partnership between the US and Indonesia to expand knowledge of marine life.

Earlier reports said that the submarine venture had also discovered 52 new species in waters 300-2,000 meters beneath the ocean’s surface, including fish, shrimp, coral and seashells.

Bandung Institute of Technology School of Life and Sciences marine biologist Noorsalam Nganro said volcanic substances from the underwater volcano had created two types of ecosystems: hydrothermal vents, with temperatures between 200 and 300 degrees Celsius; and non-hydrothermal vents, with temperatures between 2 and 3 degrees Celsius.

“We can see that there are organisms in the hydrothermal vent area, which lies in the deep sea where there is no sunlight for the photosynthesis. It means they rely on chemosynthesis, not photosynthesis,” he said.

Chemosynthesis is a process by which food (glucose) is made by bacteria using chemicals as an energy source. Chemosynthesis occurs around hydrothermal vents and methane seeps in the deep sea where sunlight is absent.

Noorsalam said the exploration opened possibilities for industrial applications using the deep sea hydrothermal microbes. He cited, among other potentials, that these microbes could convert cellulose to glucose, which could be used to make high-fructose soft drinks.

The team also found soft coral species that were similar to ones found in the Antarctica Ocean, which was a unique finding given that Indonesia was a tropical country, he said.

The photos of underwater creatures had been submitted to a team of marine biologists for further study, he added.

RI has 5.8 millions square kilometers of territorial ocean, where it is believed that most of the sea potential has yet to be discovered.