Deep Energy
Decadal Goals
- Utilize field-based investigations of approximately 25 globally representative terrestrial and marine environments to determine processes controlling the origin, form, quantities and movements of abiotic gases and organic species in Earth’s crust and uppermost mantle.
- Implement the use of DCO-sponsored instrumentation, especially revolutionary isotopologue measurements, to discriminate the abiotic versus biotic origin of methane gas and organic species sampled from global terrestrial and marine field sites.
- Quantify as a function of temperature, pressure, fluid and solid compositions, and redox state the mechanisms and rates of fluid-rock interactions that produce H2, abiotic forms of hydrocarbon gases and more complex organic compounds
- Integrate our quantitative understanding of the processes that control the origins, forms, quantities and movements of abiotic vs biotic carbon compounds with the 4-D DCEM.
Guiding Questions
How are organic molecules such as methane formed in deep Earth?
Are these organic molecules formed independently from life (abiotically)?
What characteristics of deep Earth control the movements of organic molecules?
Did mineral-mediated chemical reactions play a role in life’s origins?
How do organic molecules influence the global carbon cycle?
Image credits. Methane: Grand Prismatic Spring by Jim Peaco, National Park Service; Serpentinization: Carbonated peridotite by Katie Pratt; Hydrogen: A groundwater sampling tube descends into the Outokumpu Deep Drill Hole by Riikka Kietäväinen
Scientific Steering Committee
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Magali Ader Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris, France
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Magali AderInstitut de Physique du Globe de Paris, FrancePr. Magali Ader is a professor at the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris and serves on the Engagement Advisory Committee for DCO’s Deep Energy community. Her research sits at the intersection of Earth and life sciences, in the burgeoning field of geobiology. Using measurements of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope compositions of ancient sedimentary rocks, compared to those of analogous modern geobiological systems, she is contributing to our understanding of how Earth and life interacted through time on both a local and a global scale. Ader also serves as the international secretary of the Geochemical Society.
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Chris Ballentine University of Oxford, UK
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Chris BallentineUniversity of Oxford, UKDr. Chris Ballentine is chair of the Geochemistry Department at the University of Oxford. He has spent his scientific career developing and applying the noble gas isotope tool to different Earth systems. His research interests encompass understanding how the Earth gained its gaseous inventory and the processes controlling terrestrial reservoir interaction and evolution over time. Ballentine has been involved in organizing and building the governance and structure of the European Goldschmidt conferences since 2007; chairing Davos 2009, serving as the Goldschmidt officer for Prague 2011, and as co-convenor of Florence 2013. He also has served as president of the European Association of Geochemistry in 2013-2014.
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Peter Clift Louisiana State University, USA
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Peter CliftLouisiana State University, USADr. Peter Clift shares his knowledge of the marine geology of Asia with students from around the world. He is the Charles T. McCord Professor of petroleum geology at Louisiana State University, the Hongguo Fellowship Professor at Nanjing Normal University, a research affiliate at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a visiting professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in China. His principal research interests focus on Asia and range from the geological aspects of the petroleum systems of South and Eastern Asia, to climatic and anthropogenic impacts on the environment in monsoonal Asia, to solid Earth-climate interactions. He also actively conducts research on active margins and the origin of the continental crust, with particular interest in mass balancing the carbon and solid rock flux through the global subduction system.
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David Cole The Ohio State University, USA
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David ColeThe Ohio State University, USADr. David Cole is a professor and Ohio Research Scholar in the School of Earth Sciences at The Ohio State University. A geochemist, his research interests span a number of sub-disciplines in the geosciences and chemistry, and include both low temperature and high temperature studies relevant to energy systems. He is the OSU Interim Director of the Subsurface Energy Resource Center, Director of the OSU Subsurface Energy Materials Characterization and Analysis Laboratory. Cole serves on DCO's Synthesis Group 2019 and served previously as chair of the Deep Energy Community.
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Isabelle Daniel Université Claude Bernard Lyon, France
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Isabelle DanielUniversité Claude Bernard Lyon, FranceProf. Isabelle Daniel’s research interests focus on geobiology and minerals/rocks under extreme conditions. In her work, she employs advanced in situ experimental and analytical methods such as Raman spectroscopy and synchrotron X-ray diffraction. She investigates serpentinization and serpentine minerals, fluid-rock interactions at high pressure and microorganisms under extreme conditions. Daniel is a faculty member in Earth Sciences at the Université Claude Bernard Lyon1 in France, where she is also affiliated with the Laboratoire de Geologie de Lyon and chairs the Observatoire de Lyon. Because of the depth and breadth of her research, Daniel serves as chair of the Scientific Steering Committee for the Deep Energy Community and as a member of the Scientific Steering Committee for the Deep Life Community. She is also active in the DCO’s Extreme Physics and Chemistry Community.
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Pablo García del Real Fugro USA Marine, Inc.
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Pablo García del RealFugro USA Marine, Inc.Dr. Pablo García del Real's research broadly focuses on carbonate mineralization, serpentinization, and seafloor seepage. García del Real received his Ph.D. in Geological and Environmental Sciences from Stanford University in 2016. From 2016 to 2017, he was a postdoctoral researcher at Université Lyon 1, working in the lab of DCO Executive Committee member and Deep Energy Community Chair Dr. Isabelle Daniel. García del Real is currently a Project Geoscientist at Fugro's Seeps--Centre of Excellence where he studies the geophysical and geochemical signatures of marine seepage worldwide.
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Nils Holm Stockholm University, Sweden
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Nils HolmStockholm University, SwedenDr. Nils Holm is Professor Emeritus of marine geochemistry of the Stockholm University. Holm is interested in organic compounds in marine hydrothermal environments and their importance for the carbon cycle and the formation of early life on Earth and other terrestrial plants. He also works on questions related to the deep subsurface biosphere and its potential existence in an astrobiological context.
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Long Li University of Alberta, Canada
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Long LiUniversity of Alberta, CanadaDr. Long Li is an assistant professor of Earth and atmospheric sciences at the University of Alberta. Li is a stable isotope geochemist working on carbon and nitrogen cycles at a variety of spatial and temporal scales, with particular interest in carbon and nitrogen behaviors during fluid-rock interaction, subduction-zone metamorphism, and volcanism from modern to deep time on Earth.
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Tullis Onstott Princeton University, USA
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Tullis OnstottPrinceton University, USADr. Tullis Onstott is a professor of geosciences at Princeton University. For 23 years, he has focused his research on subsurface microbial life. His research involves exploration of subsurface microbial ecosystems via mines, drilling, and new underground laboratories, and quantifying their community structure, function, and activity. His group analyzes metagenomes, metatranscriptomes and metaproteomes, performs stable isotope measurements, and combines geochemical measurements with thermodynamic models. In 2007,Time Magazine named Onstott one of the 100 most influential people in the world. The U.S. Department of Energy also recognized his excellent research with awards on three occasions.
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Magali Pujol TOTAL, France
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Magali PujolTOTAL, FranceDr. Magali Pujol is a reservoir engineer with TOTAL at the Institut National Polytechnique de Lorraine. A geochemist, Pujol's research encompasses isotope geochemistry, including stable isotope analysis, geochronology, and noble gases.
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Igor Tolstikhin Kola Science Center of Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia
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Igor TolstikhinKola Science Center of Russian Academy of Sciences, RussiaDr. Igor Tolstikhin has spent his career answering the question “How does nature work?” using isotopic compositions of the elements in natural materials. His current research activity includes noble gas mass-spectrometry, isotope cosmo-geochemistry, isotope hydrology, and modeling of the Earth’s chemical evolution. Tolstikhin is affiliated with Institutes of Russian Academy of Science, the Geological Institute of Kola Science Center, Apatity, and the Space Research Institute, Moscow. In 2013 the European Association of Geochemistry recognized Tolstikhin’s many contributions to deciphering how nature works with the presentation of its Urey Award.
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Edward Young University of California, Los Angeles, USA
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Edward YoungUniversity of California, Los Angeles, USADr. Edward Young is a professor of geology at UCLA and co-Chair of the Deep Energy Community. His research spans geochemistry and cosmochemistry. He envisioned and oversaw the development of the Panorama High-Resolution Mass Spectrometer, which is capable of unprecedented measurements of isotopic bonder ordering in methane gas, making it possible to accurately define the origin and provenance of various sources of methane. He also is principal investigator on a study that is advancing understanding of the extent to which isotopologues can differentiate between biotic and abiotic carbon compounds. The Geochemical Society and the European Association of Geochemistry formally recognized Young’s contributions to geochemistry by naming him fellow. He also is a fellow of the Meteoritical Society.