Lost City pumps life-essential chemicals at rates unseen at typical black smokers

Gases are collected from the top of one of the hydrothermal vents that make up Lost City. This closeup, showing an area of the vent about a foot wide, reveals the delicate texture of newly formed carbonate minerals and -- in the upper right -- filaments of bacteria wafting in the warm vent fluids. As the carbonate ages it becomes hard as concrete, one reason the tallest vent at Lost City has grown to be 18-stories tall. Credit: University of Washington, IFE, URI-IAO, NOAA