Could Music be the Solution to Our Disappearing Forests?

Elizabeth Sprason on 7 April 2024

Noise pollution is a major concern in our community from simply annoying neighbours to affecting our mood and sleep patterns. In the natural world, it is well known that loud noises caused by humans can affect wild animals’ hunting and foraging abilities. However, for mycelium, a type of fungi, certain noises might be beneficial. Researchers at Flinders University have discovered that music helps promote growth in fungi.

The rate at which Trichoderma harzianum produced spores following regular exposure to a sound at 8kHz was measured by the researchers to prove that ‘ecoacoustics’ can be a viable way of restoring ecosystems. The use of sounds has previously been helpful to measure soil health but it’s never previously been used as an active solution.

Fungi play a massive role within the forest ecosystem. Forest Ecology Professor Suzanne Simard at the University of British Columbia discovered the ‘Wood Wide Web’ which is a fungal network that shares resources such as carbon and deliver signals between plant species spanning acres of forest. Similar to the human nervous system, action potentials have been detected within certain species which even suggests the fungi can ‘talk’ to each other. Mycelium species have a symbiotic relationship with the trees as the fungi gain essential nutrients synthesised by the trees (e.g. sugar) which the fungi are unable to produce themselves. In return, forest plants receive access to a pool of difficult-to-find nutrients and can share chemical signals that warn of changes to their environment, for example. This mutual relationship is often threatened by deforestation, intensive farming, and pollution. The Wood Wide Web can take years to fully develop with studies showing that urban plants often don’t fair as well against disease and extreme weather events than their wilder counterparts who have access to a strong web network. Therefore, it is important to find effective ways to rejuvenate fungal species in ecosystems.

Before you start singing at the top your lungs in the Meanwood Valley, the study found that the most effective frequency for mycelium growth was above 5kHz. Ariana Grande, who is well known for her high pitch singing, can only reach frequencies of around 2600 Hz. The way that the researchers set up the equipment involved placing the samples into attenuation chambers that blocked out any outside noises and stimulated the sample dishes for 30 minutes a day with Bluetooth speakers. Future experiments, lead researcher J. Robinson suggests, should aim to discover whether specific frequencies can promote growth in desirable fungi like the ones in the Wood Wide Web and inhibit the growth of species that are responsible for diseases like pneumonia.

There may be some time in the future when nature walks won’t just be accompanied by the sound of bird song; forest speakers may begin to play accompanying tracks for the subterranean ecosystem. Improving the growth rate of the fungi will result in an accelerated restoration of natural habitats and improve the resilience of our natural spaces.

A Consortium of Octopuses

Rosie Bibby on 7 April 2024

Released from the research vessel Falkor in late 2023, a remotely operated vehicle dove into the depths of the Pacific Ocean off the Coast Rican coast. After descending 3km, two low temperature hydrothermal springs were discovered. You may be more familiar with hot hydrothermal vents, which hold a temperature of around 350°C making them easy to identify from their plumes of smoke arising from the sea floor. Contrastingly, low temperature springs warm the water to only about 10°C warmer than the seabed’s average of 2°C and are therefore much harder to identify.

Previous explorations had ascertained low temperature hydrothermal springs as brooding areas for octopus as they gather to lay their eggs in areas of warmer water. But aboard the Falkor, an incredible discovery was made. These two new springs were found to be home to an octopus and skate nursery, withholding four previously undiscovered species of octopus! Details of each species is yet to be publicly known; however, one has been named the Dorado octopus after the nearby rock formation it was found near.

These new species of octopus have been identified as solitary by the researchers, and this is typical behaviour of deep-sea octopuses. Local scientific knowledge was utilised in these expeditions and the specimens that were collected will be displayed at the University of Costa Rica’s Museum of Zoology, for the locals to enjoy. It is vital to include local knowledge and expertise for biodiversity conservation as it can provide insight into areas and topics that were previously unknown by Western science. Moreover, this project trained local researchers into how to lead future expeditions such as these, to ensure a comprehensive analysis of the species in this area is achieved.

Having the most up to date knowledge on biodiversity is vital for the formation of conservation policy. Due to the inaccessibility of deep marine environments, it is hard to achieve protection for these areas. Particularly as the prospects of deep-sea mining, which extracts mineral depositions from the seabed, is gathering motion and international legislation prohibiting it is absent. There are vast resources of nickel, cobalt, copper and other metals in the ocean, most of which have been untouched thus far. However, as many countries begin to make a green transition, there is a heightened demand for metals used in electric car batteries, wind turbines and solar panels, most of which can be found in the deep sea.

Although reducing our dependency on non-renewable energy is a positive step towards combatting climate change; the effects of deep-sea mining has proven to be disastrous for animal populations due to noise, vibration, suspended sediment and light pollution. Octopuses, alongside other deep-sea creatures, utilise sound for survival in the absence of light. If deep sea mining persists, this sensory ability will be contested, making navigation for finding food and partners difficult for such animals. Disturbance from mining could be detrimental to our new octopus species. Furthermore, as deep-sea ecosystems act as carbon sinks, destroying these habitats from deep sea mining could have an overall negative impact on the climate. As the International Seabed Authority (ISA) has yet to compile regulations against deep sea mining, the future for these newly discovered octopuses remains uncertain.