This place on Earth has no life despite abundant water

Addis Ababa: There is one confirmed place on Earth which does not harbour any form of life despite the presence of water: Hot, saline, hyperacid ponds in the Dallol geothermal field in Ethiopia. It means that the presence of liquid water on a planet, which is often used as a habitability criterion, does not directly imply that it has life.

Living beings, especially microorganisms, have a surprising ability to adapt to the most extreme environments on our planet but not at the Dallol geothermal field. The infernal landscape of Dallol, located in the Ethiopian depression of Danakil, extends over a volcanic crater full of salt, where toxic gases emanate and water boils in the midst of intense hydrothermal activity.

It is one of the most torrid environments on Earth. There, daily temperatures in winter can exceed 45 degrees Celsius and there are abundant hypersaline and hyperacid pools, with pH values that are even negative. “What does exist is a great diversity of halophilic archaea (a type of primitive salt-loving microorganisms) in the desert and the saline canyons around the hydrothermal site, but neither in the hyperacid and hypersaline pools themselves, nor in the so-called Black and Yellow lakes of Dallol, where magnesium abounds,” explained Garcia. (IANS)

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