Facts on the Mariana Trench
Size:
- Deeper than Mt. Everest is tall by over a mile
- 120 times larger than the Grand Canyon
- Runs for roughly 1550 miles
- Extends down nearly 7 miles
Location:
- Located just east of the Mariana Islands
- East of Japan
- East of the Phillipine Sea
- North of New Guinea
Facts:
- The Mariana Trench Marine National Monument (est. 2009), covering 95,216 square miles of submerged lands, is one of the largest marine protected areas in the world.
- On *date*, James Cameron dove down into the Mariana Trench in a submarine, to study its diverse organisms
- It took him 2 hours and 36 minutes to hit the bottom on his way down, and 1 hour and 10 minutes to break the surface on his way back up.
- The Mariana Trench is the deepest part of Earth's oceans; in fact, it is the deepest location on all of Earth itself.
- The deepest part of the ocean is known as the abyssal zone.
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Mariana Trench Images
Map Location
In comparison to Mt. Everest
Sea cucumber
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Biology in the Mariana Trench
- The microorganisms living at this depth are immune to heavy metals that are toxic to other organisms; this could lead to biomedical breakthroughs if scientists can discover how these microorganisms resist the metals.
- These microorganisms can also feed on methane and various oils.
- XENOPHYOPHORES
- Single-celled organisms
- Many nuclei, but one cell
- Up to 4 inches in length
- They consume food by surrounding and absorbing it
- FISH
- Snailfish
- Currently hold the record as deepest living fish ever photographed
- It was filmed 4.8 miles below the surface
- CRUSTACEANS
- Amphipods
- Related to shrimp
- They will eat almost anything, including each other
- MOLLUSKS
- It's hard for them to grow shells because of the water pressure deep in the trench
- Snails with soft shells have been discovered in the trench
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