One of the most spectacular events of the present century, concerning all biological and environmental disciplines, was the discovery of deep-sea hydrothermal vents around the Galapagos Islands, during the late 1970s. This remarkable scientific accomplishment was achieved thanks to the extensive work carried out by oceanographers and geologists. A significant role in terms of scientific support...

The hydrothermal vent crab Xenograpsus testudinatus (Crustacea: Brachyura) is endemic near Kueishan Island, Taiwan, where it lives in shallow waters close to the hydrothermal vents located in this area. X. testudinatus is adapted to a sulfur-rich and thus potentially toxic environment. It has established a specialized feeding strategy focusing on dead zooplankton organisms killed by the toxic d...

Deep-sea hydrothermal vents play an important role in global biogeochemical cycles, providing biological oases at the seafloor that are supported by the thermal and chemical flux from the Earth's interior. As hot, acidic and reduced hydrothermal fluids mix with cold, alkaline and oxygenated seawater, minerals precipitate to form porous sulphide-sulphate deposits. These structures provide microh...

The papers in the " Hydrothermal Vent " research topic cover a range of microbiological research in deep and shallow hydrothermal environments, from high temperature " black smokers, " to diffuse flow habitats and episodically discharging subsurface fluids, to the hydrothermal plumes. Together they provide a snapshot of current research interests in a field that has evolved rapidly since the di...

Bathymodiolinae are giant mussels that were discovered at hydrothermal vents and harboring chemosynthetic symbionts. Due to their close phylogenetic relationship with seep species and tiny mussels from organic substrates, it was hypothesized that they gradually evolved from shallow to deeper environments, and specialized in decaying organic remains, then in seeps, and finally colonized deep-sea...

A culture-independent molecular phylogenetic survey was carried out for a bacterial and archaeal community of a mineralized crust coating a sulphide spire, which was collected from the Edmond vent field (23 ° S, 69 ° E, 3300 m depth) on the Central Indian Ridge. Small-subunit rRNA genes (16S rDNA) were amplified from environmental DNA by PCR utilizing Bacteria-specific, and Archaea-specific 16S...

A novel hybrid polyketide-terpenoid, aspergstressin (1), possessing a unique fused polycyclic structure, was induced from culture broth of strain Aspergillus sp. WU 243 by cobalt ion stimulation. The strain was isolated from the digestive gland of Xenograpsus testudinatus, a unique type of crab which dwells in the Kueishantao hydrothermal vents off Taiwan. The chemical structure and relative co...