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María Eugenia Farías - Puna, stromatolites, the origin of life and extreme science.
I'm a scientist and I'm going to tell you the story of a discovery.
This discovery began with a lot of questions
that I used to ask myself as a child.
For example, when I finished Catechism
and was ready to receive First Communion,
I wasn't really convinced because I couldn't find,
after reading the Genesis, the Old and the New Testament in their entirety
where were the dinosaurs.
My dad, who was a scientist, sent me to a priest.
After that, at 10, I began to develop a passion for white sharks.
At that time, through National Geographic's magazine.
But my first big existential crisis
came by reading Carl Sagan.
By reading Carl Sagan I became aware that we're a tiny dot
in an infinite time and space.
How can we leave a footprint of our existence as persons, as a community, as a society, as a species,
in such an infinite time and space?
Close your eyes and imagine the infinite.
Something that doesn't end, and doesn't end, and still doesn't end, and give me a tranquilizer, please,
because that caused me a lot of anxiety, since childhood.
If we add time, the idea that the universe originated 13 to 15 billion years ago,
that the Milky Way is about 13.2 billion years old,
that planet Earth is about 4.5 billion years old
and that the first sign of life on Earth is 3.8 billion years old.
But life needn't have originated on planet Earth.
When you study the universe, you find that infinite universe
is full of organic molecules.
Those organic molecules are the bricks of life.
Life could be travelling from planet to planet.
It only takes one cell, just one molecule, one bacterium to spread life on a planet.
And this molecule, this bacterium, this life spore
could be travelling from planet to planet.
This could happen in the entire universe.
But let's see what happens in the Solar System.
In the Solar System, the closest planet to Earth is Mars.
Life could have come from Mars.
Why can we say that or make a hypothesis on that?
Because Mars, billion years ago, wasn't a red planet,
with no oxygen and, above all, with water
only in a frozen state in the polar ice caps, as it is now.
BIllion years ago, Mars had liquid water
and it could have been the place where life originated
and then travelled to the Earth.
It could have travelled on a meteorite.
In fact, there are meteorites that came from Mars, fell on the Earth
and show signs of organic activity.
So, if I'm a cell, or a spore, or a molecule that is going to travel through space
I've got to be very resistant. I've got to be an extremophile.
An extremophile is a bacterium that thrives in extreme conditions.
And since we still can't travel to Mars because we haven't developed the necessary technology,
although I think we are getting at it,
we'll study, for the time being, how that life would be in an environment
that is the most similar to Mars that we have on Earth, the Puna.
We are microbiologists. We've been working in the Puna for 10 years.
We've been studying bacteria, microorganisms, forms of life
that can stand, in the Puna, a series of extreme conditions,
such as high ultraviolet radiation, because of its elevation,
low oxygen tension, high arsenic levels,
an environment with highly saline water, drastic climate changes,
strong winds. All these conditions are similar to the ones that would be present nowadays in planets like Mars
or would have been present in that primitive Earth.
In that environment, 2 years ago, we found stromatolites.
The news had such an impact that it made it to Nature magazine.
Why? Because these stromatolites were alive.
We're going to see what a stromatolite is, and to do so we're going to travel in time.
We're going to go 3.8 billion years ago, to that primitive planet.
In that primitive planet that was the Earth, there was no ozone layer,
therefore, ultraviolet radiation ruined any form of life.
Life had to grow hidden in the depths of the seas
or hidden under rocks.
At that time there was no oxygen, so life had to breathe other type of molecules
and grew very slowly.
In that primitive environment there was a lot of volcanic activity,
drastic temperature changes,
highly saline waters full of metals. ¿Does this sound similar to you?
Those conditions are a lot like what we have in the Puna.
In that primitive environment emerged that first RNA molecule
that was able to double itself and give place to a DNA molecule
that wrapped itself in a membrane, just like a drop of oil,
and began to separate what came in and what went out.
That's how the first cell emerged, the first protocell.
That first protocell joined other cells and they invented photosynthesis.
And since it was too complicated to survive under those conditions, they combined,
and that biological activity began precipitating minerals,
it began capturing carbon dioxide, which was then converted into calcium carbonate,
that is to say, into a rock, into something that when the living part dies, the fossil remains.
That colony of seaweeds and bacteria captured carbon dioxide, released oxygen
and through billions of years, created the ozone layer.
It released oxygen into the atmosphere and life stopped being anaerobic and began being aerobic.
Because of this it grew faster, it could evolve, it gave place to the first multicellular organisms,
to invertebrates, to the first fishes, to amphibious creatures, to the reptiles that then conquered the Earth,
to the mammals that created the telescope, that saw the universe
and that even asked themselves: what am I doing here?
Therefore, stromatolites played a key role in converting
that hostile planet into the Earth, into this blue planet that we know today.
There are live stromatolites in other regions of the world as well.
In the Bahamas, in Cuatro Ciénagas in Mexico (a place we are losing now
due to intense use of water for agriculture),
in Shark Bay in Australia, in Yellowstone.
But all the ones described so far had been at sea level and in warm climates.
The ones found in the Puna are the first to be found
in conditions of high ultraviolet radiation, low oxygen tension,
in conditions similar to the ones found in that primitive Earth.
The discovery of the stromatolites in the Puna is a look into our past
as living beings on the Earth.
This is Lake Socompa. Those rocks there, those are the stromatolites.
If we cut those rocks, that could go unnoticed,
we would find these layers.
Each of those layers was once on top.
Each of those layers is a line of growth of these live rocks called stromatolites.
Let's see what we can find inside a stromatolite through an electronic microscope
so that you will believe me that they are alive.
Those are diatoms, those are minerals
and that is a mineral with bacteria. That round thing there is a bacterium.
But that wasn't all. In Socompa, not only did we find live stromatolites but also fossil ones.
That's why we call it the microbial Jurassic Park. Just like in the movie,
the paleontologist, with a dinosaur's skull, thought about velociraptors' socialization.
Well, then he found a live velociraptor.
This is the same. Fossil stromatolites give us the question, modern stromatolites help us answer it.
It is one of the few places in the world, if not the only one,
in which both fossil and modern stromatolites coexist.
And if we go to the electronic microscope, we'll find no difference
between what is fossilized and what is modern.
The fossil part is so well preserved that there is no difference.
Why? Because we're next to a volcano. An active volcano,
a volcano that eliminates silica in its ashes,
and this reminds us of Pompeya for example, you know,
a city that was completely mummified by the ashes of a volcano.
It would happen the same here. We have modern bacteria of a modern stromatolite
and of a fossil stromatolite.
But let's go further. I told you that Mars went through evolutionary cycles,
during which there might have been conditions that might have supported life.
In fact, the rover probe took pictures of Mars that are quite intriguing
and that show these structures that are similar to the ones found in Socompa,
these fossil stratified mountains, very much like the stratified parts of Socompa's fossil stromatolites.
If we look into the electronic microscope, we're also quite stricken
by what is found in Mars in relation to what is found in Socompa.
These are live stromatolites, we are raising them as pets in the laboratory.
Stromatolites (actually, each carries the name of one of my kids)
Stromatolites have been alive for... not these ones, of course,
but stromatolites as a form of life have been alive for 3.8 billion years.
There were 3 mass extinctions on the Earth.
And they were able once again, after a greenhouse effect,
to capture carbon dioxide, release oxygen and prepare the Earth for a new form of life.
Stromatolites have a wide variety of biotechnological applications,
for example in biofuels or bioremediation.
They captured carbon dioxide perfectly,
and this reminds us of global warming.
We could use them to reverse all the damage we are doing to the environment.
After discovering stromatolites in Socompa,
we continued looking for new environments feeling as if we were fighting the clock.
I mean, when your way of seeing things changes, everything looks different.
And we also found stromatolites in Tolar Grande.
In Sea Eyes of Tolar Grande. That isn't the Caribbean, that is the Puna,
and those are stromatolite reefs.
Diamond Lake is located right into Galán volcano's crater,
4.700 meters above sea level,
where we have a very high PH, a salinity which is 8 times sea salinity
and a never before seen concentration of arsenic: 230 mg/L.
There is life under those conditions, there are bacteria forming these sort of structures very similar to the ones of that primitive Earth.
We can also find this in Jujuy, in Salta, in the Lluillaillaco, in Antofalla salt flat.
That is a natural color, those are bacteria.
From this point on... and I hope I have convinced you and you have understood what a stromatolite is.
Now I'm gonna tell you about my personal experience while making this discovery.
There were 2 paths: to do what scientists generally do, that is to publish it,
first to study it, which takes quite a lot of time, and then to publish it and tell other scientists about it.
But, at the same time, I realized that in the Puna, in the places where these discoveries were
there were problems, serious problems. For example, one of them was
that there was pollution in Sea Eyes of Tolar Grande,
a pollution that was causing stromatolites to die.
Another of these problems is the imminent export of the Puna's water to Chile,
to be used in the mining industry.
Bringing water from the Pacific, 500 kms away, desalinating and using it
is much more expensive than bringing fresh water from the Puna's region, 45 km away.
So, these environments are in serious risk.
Mining, you know that Argentina has the third largest lithium reserve in the world.
Every square millimeter in the Puna is at the moment licensed or exploited
for mining, especially in salt flat areas.
And all these environments need water and are associated to salt flats... to the Puna's salt flats.
Another problem was robbery. Robbery for biotechnological companies,
you never know, a piece of stromatolite is this small, anyone can take it away, a tourist can take it away as a keepsake.
So, it was necessary to legislate, it was necessary to guard the place, it was necessary to lay down restricted areas
and it was necessary to get money for the research.
How to do it? We are scientists, we aren't very well-known, we are in Tucumán.
One person that really inspired me was Dr. Teresa Manera de Bianco,
who discovered some footprints in Pehuencó, some footprints of extinct fossils, 20 years ago.
After 20 years and winning the Rolex prize, the place was finally recognized,
declared Reserve and protected from 4x4 vehicles.
She spent 20 years witnessing her discovery being destroyed little by little.
Only after 20 years, she was my age when she discovered them,
she could spend her first summer, this last one, with the area fenced with wire.
Now that I'm talking about her, she told me that when a scientists makes a discovery
he or she must be responsible for it in front of the society.
How to take charge of it? The way I found was with scientific divulgation.
Scientific divulgation requires 3 things:
First, the scientist must be capable of speaking clearly so that everyone can understand,
for example, what a stromatolite is.
It also requires a society interested in what a stromatolite is,
a society not only interested in watching Tinelli.
A society, and I think this is what's taking place now,
interested in Canal Encuentro or Discovery Channel,
a society with other interests; and I think our society was prepared for this.
On the other hand, we need scientific journalists capable of divulging things correctly.
This actually happened. The first to know about the discovery, because it was the most respectful thing to do,
were Tolar Grande's inhabitants.
In an assembly, they were told what had been found.
In fact, the Pachamama was asked for permission before carrying out the research.
From there it got to a newspaper from Salta, El Tribuno, it made the front page both the 26th and 27th of August,
and that afternoon, they called me from the Environment Agency in Salta to ask me what had happened.
I had told them many times to beware because what they had was something special and they might lose it.
So, it was published. That very afternoon I was traveling to Salta to meet the Environment Agency's people
From there it got to Clarín newspaper. That was a boom and I gave approximately 40 interviews in a day.
Everyone wanted to know about the stromatolites.
Then it got to La Nación newspaper, and that's when I started to realize the power of mass media
and I dared to ask for changes in law so that stromatolites would be declared national patrimony
and that afternoon I got a call from the Senate.
It was featured in Wikipedia and it made it to Nature.
Nature. We're from Tucumán. Can you imagine how it feels like to read the word "Tucumán" in Nature?
From all this I came up with a concept.
A scientific discovery, when divulged through mass media, has an impact on tourism.
A lot of people started to come just because this was published all around the world,
after being featured in Nature it spread through every newspaper
in the scientific part of the world.
It has an impact on tourism. A lot of people started to come
to see the stromatolites of Tolar Grande, Socompa.
It had an impact on the community. It has an impact on the community because
it brings in much more economic resources.
It has an impact on the environment and requires an answer from the government.
What answer have we got over the last 2 years?
If we talk about infrastructure, Tolar, a town of 100 inhabitants
that is 8 hours away from Salta and 3 hours away from Chile, in the middle of nowhere,
now has mains sewerage.
This happened in a year and a half. We're in Argentina, we're in the Puna,
we're in the province of Salta.
We got the area of Sea Eyes of Tolar Grande to be fenced
and now paths are being built to keep tourists from stepping on the place.
If we talk about tourism, and this is a very clear concept,
nothing can be preserved if it isn't profitable.
So, the way to preserve this is to make it profitable.
And how can it become profitable? With extreme tourism,
with alternative tourism, with... and this is the concept I want to introduce,
with scientific tourism.
First, we needed to prepare Tolar Grandes inhabitants so that they could be guides
and could tell what a stromatolite is.
Next, we needed to create a tourist route. The scientific tourism route.
The route of the origin of life, in which the tourist goes on a 4x4 vehicle
from Jujuy to La Rioja.
It goes through the Puna, makes use of native communities' infrastructure
and brings economic development to those communities.
Also, together with the University of Córdoba, we're going to build an interpretation centre that will cover
from the origin of life to the universe.
This is a project by the nation's Ministry of Science and Technique.
We also obtained scientific results, and we can proudly say that we've performed
the first genome sequencing in Argentina. Until a year ago this was done abroad.
Genetic information and biotechnological applications were not fully staying in the country.
We also assembled the first metagenome of stromatolites in Socompa
and obtained funding through tender
to carry out scientific research to support the preservation of this place.
On the topic of conservation, we are involved in a project
that is the Noah's ark of microorganisms.
I hope all these places can be preserved.
I hope we are not too late if we take into account things like water exportation or mining interests.
But if these places can't be preserved, then I hope at least
we can recover, store and keep the collection of genes in the laboratory,
because they can provide us with a lot of answers about the origin of life
and about humanity's biotechnological problems.
Another great thing that we've accomplished, and I think this is, after my 3 children,
what I'm most proud of until now,
is that Lake Socompa and Sea Eyes of Tolar Grande
were declared protected areas.
We've got to take into account that there is a lot of mining interest in these territories
and that they were declared protected areas because of bacteria,
that require a microscope to be seen. They are neither flamingos nor polar bears: they are bacteria.
That took place in March this year.
And in the project I'm involved with I'm in touch with scientists
that are working on projects with the NASA, and our goal is to declare stromatolites from all over the world
humanity's scientific patrimony,
because they have a lot of things to tell about the origin of our lives... of life on Earth.
Last, I'd like to leave you a message: save the bacteria.
Thank you very much!