The molecule found in cells that produces the protective effect against high external pressure is called TMAO - trimethylamine N-oxide. If we can understand how these organisms survive at extreme pressure, we can apply these findings to the wider study of biomolecular stability.” High external pressure “We need to understand what happens to water under pressure and how pressure-adapted organisms combat these effects. “These high pressures distort the liquid water that resides in all life, resulting in detrimental impacts to the biomolecules that underpin all biological processes. In the depths of the oceans, organisms live under extreme high pressures that would destroy human life. Professor Lorna Dougan, from the School of Physics and Astronomy at Leeds, said: “Life has adapted to survive and thrive in environmental extremes. In reporting their findings, the researchers in Leeds have for the first time been able to provide an explanation of how a molecule found in the cells of marine organisms counteracts the effect of external pressure on the water molecules.
Professor Lorna Dougan, School of Physics and Astronomy Our study provides a bridge between water under pressure at the molecular level and the wonderful ability of organisms which thrive under high pressure in depths of the oceans. When this happens to the water inside living cells, it prevents vital bio-chemical processes from taking place - and kills the organism. At high pressure, though, the network of water molecules begins to distort and change shape. Under normal or atmospheric pressure, water molecules form a tetrahedron-like network. That is a 1,100-fold increase of the pressure experienced at the Earth’s surface. In one of the deepest points in the Pacific - the Mariana Trench, 11 kilometers below the sea surface - the pressure is 1.1 kbar or eight tons per square inch. The deeper that sea creatures live, the more inhospitable and extreme the environment they must cope with. Scientists have discovered how a chemical in the cells of marine organisms enables them to survive the high pressures found in the deep oceans.
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