Discovery of asphalt seeps in the deep Southwest Atlantic off Brazil

Bacterial diversity in deep-sea sediments under influence of asphalt seep at the São Paulo Plateau

“…The high abundance of Alphaproteobacteria and Acidimicrobiia in our samples may be explained by the presence of oil from the asphalt seep at São Paulo Plateau [12, 14]. Some Alphaproteobacteria taxa are able to degrade hydrocarbon such as the Rhodobacteraceae family [36, 37] composed 5% of sequences present in our samples.…”

“…This cooperative project integrated the Quest for the Limits of Life (QUELLE) 2013 carried out by JAMSTEC (Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology). During the cruise that explored the deep seafloor of the North São Paulo Plateau in Espírito Santo Basin (2500-3600 m), asphalt seeps were found at a depth of 2,700 m colonized by non-chemosynthetic megafaunal organisms [12]. They also found that, in non-asphalt seeps areas, outcrops of mudstone were covered by black manganese oxide crusts and nodules were also present [12, 13, 14].…”

A Synthesis Review of Emissions and Fates for the Coal Oil Point Marine Hydrocarbon Seep Field and California Marine Seepage

“…The importance of seep-related substrate, typically authigenic carbonates, is significant to the diversity and richness of seep ecosystems [2], a role that can be filled by other substrate materials. For example, recent observations of asphalt seepage without active gas or oil emissions found assemblages of nonchemosynthetic megafaunal organisms [80]. Specifically, a rich diversity of megafauna, including sponges and gorgonians, was observed for asphalt seeps off Brazil at 2,700 m depth.…”

Slow Volcanoes: The Intriguing Similarities Between Marine Asphalt and Basalt Lavas

“…Asphalt deposits have been observed at an increasing number of locations worldwide, including in Santa Barbara Basin (Vernon and Slater, 1963;Valentine et al, 2010), the southern and northern Gulf of Mexico (MacDonald et al, 2004;Weiland et al, 2008;Williamson et al, 2008;Sahling et al, 2016;NOAA, 2017), the Angolan margin (Jones et al, 2014), and the southwest Atlantic Ocean offshore Brazil (Fujikura et al, 2017). All of these known submarine asphalt deposits are linked either to salt diapirism or to compressional tectonics.…”