Why Did The Geologist Who Discovered The Oldest Water On Earth Taste It?

Back in2016 , a team of geologists deep down in a Canadian mine made quite the discovery – hang weewee that , when tested , was establish to be over 2.6 billion age old . It became the world ’s oldest water , but it guide over from a find made by the same team in the same mine three age premature – and that clock time , one of them tasted it .

If this was a movie , this would be the part when everyone sitting in the dramaturgy would be internally screaming “ NO DON’T DO IT ! ” – but sometimes you ’ve just buzz off to let that little hobgoblin inside your brain win . Or , in this case , because prove out what you ’re put to work on is standard transportation for scientists .

“ If you ’re a geologist who work with rocks , you ’ve probablylicked a mass of stone , ” Professor Barbara Sherwood Lollar , who lead the team , toldCNNafter the 2013 discovery . Plus , although not the most rigorous of methods , taste can help to steer you in the commission of the former piss ; the saltier the taste , the older it is potential to be .

Though emphatically not good enough to fuddle ream and reams of it – Sherwood Lollar place out that it was also “ scientifically too valuable to waste like that ” – the geologist did dunk a finger in and adhere it on the tip of her tongue .

So , the question we ’re certain you ’re all beg to eff the response to : what did this prohibited water taste like ?

“ Very salty and acerbic – much saltier than saltwater , ” according to Sherwood Lollar . Not quite a scathing review , but it does n’t make it sound particularly appetizing either .

It ’s unclear if Sherwood Lollar or any of the residual of the squad also savour the liquid state that took over the rubric of “ Earth ’s Oldest water supply ” in 2016 , but we can imagine it probably did n’t taste any nicer .

However , what the more recently discovered ancient water may lack in deliciousness is more than made up for by what analysis has state us about it .

“ By front at the sulfate in the water supply , we were able to see a fingermark that ’s significative of the mien of life , ” Sherwood Lollar toldBBC Newsin 2016 . “ And we were able to suggest that the signaling we are seeing in the fluid has to have been produced by microbiology - and most importantly has to have been produced over a very long time scale . ”

“ The bug that produced this touch could n’t have done it overnight , " the geologist bring . “ This has to be an indicant that being have been present in these fluid on a geologic timescale . ”