The Cave of Moville in Romania: a closed ecosystem

Just imagine a cave labyrinth, isolated from the outside world, where spiders, scorpions, worms and other bizarre creatures creep. This unique natural phenomenon reminds, rather, the underground world of Jules Verne ("Journey to the Center of the Earth") than a real place. The Cave of Moville in Romania, discovered in 1986, is one of the most isolated places on Earth, which turned out to be a fruitful location for research of scientists. They believe that studying this unusual cave can provide answers to many questions, including the appearance of life on Earth.

Lost world of mutants

In 1986, during the construction work was accidentally discovered the cave of Moville, which is located near the western coast of the Black Sea. Later, a whole secret kingdom of strange living beings was revealed, which were clearly cut off from the outside world for many generations. Among them are spiders, leeches, centipedes, beetles, flatworms, mites, and also such aquatic inhabitants as water scorpions and nematode worms.

The Cave of Movile is a closed ecosystem, the uniqueness of which consists in the fact that practically all living organisms are independent of the energy of sunlight. Therefore, there is no photosynthetic vegetation here. Unusual creatures are fueled by energy from the metabolism of hydrogen sulfide, carried out by dense layers of bacteria that live on the walls of the cave. These bacteria produce sulfuric acid, which increases the internal volumes of the cave due to the burning out of the space in the limestone rocks.

Features of the cave ecosystem

The air seeps into the cave through tiny cracks, but the atmosphere is very different from the outside: carbon dioxide here is 100 times greater than on the surface, and oxygen is 10 times smaller; There is also an increased content of hydrogen sulfide produced by natural sulfur sources. Ordinary animals react instantly to the slightest changes in the level of oxygen and try to quickly leave the place where foreign substances are found in the air.

The Cave of Movile (Romania) is characterized by rather difficult conditions for survival, therefore organisms that are capable of carrying out their vital activity under such extreme conditions have a number of notable characteristics. For example, a pale yellow appearance, since the distinctive feature of all cave creatures is the absence of a coloring pigment. All are born blind, except for spiders that have eight eyes, like their terrestrial relatives. However, over time, and their vision is lost as useless. Orient in the dark they are helped by large antennae.

Mutants from the cave do not need eyes

Eyes are complex structures that are prone to illness and injury. If a living creature somehow got into extreme cave conditions, complete darkness, then it can lead to damage to the surface of the eyes, purulent infections that provoke the death of the animal. Acidic medium also has deleterious effects on eye health.

The thousands-strong history of the Romanian caves has given numerous generations of its inhabitants enough time for maximum adaptation to the new environment. This adaptation is based on the inherent genetic information, as well as adaptive losses and defects in the process of gradual mutations.

Geographical and ecological features

The Cave of Movile (Romania) is located near the city of Mangalia, in the south-eastern part of the country, just a few kilometers from the Black Sea. The entrance is a shaft 18 meters deep. The total length of this relatively small cave with narrow passages covered with clay is about 300 meters. In the lower part is a small lake.

When the Earth's climate changed 5.5 million years ago, having passed from a tropical to a more moderate one, the only animals that managed to survive were those who stayed to live in deep warm caves underground. The Cave of Mowille is one of the most unusual ecosystems of the Earth, being inhabited by various species of invertebrate animals that have adapted to the harsh conditions of their underground prison. More or less studied are 46 species of terrestrial and aquatic invertebrates, 31 of which have never been found elsewhere.

Cave of Moville (Romania): photos of invertebrates

The overwhelming majority of cave dwellers belong to the class of arachnids, crustaceans and insects. Eighteen species of hydrobionts include flat, round (nematodes, rotifers), ringworms, as well as blind leeches, snails and carnivorous water scorpions. In the cave, there are also mastiffs, centipedes.

The Cave of Moville in the south of Romania is a completely unique environment. Despite the almost complete tightness and lack of sunlight, the cave is a thriving ecosystem filled with a wide variety of life forms, from tiny crustaceans to isopods, mollusks and arachnids. On the rest of the planet, ecosystems are maintained by such primary producers, capable of photosynthesis, like plants or algae, which can be eaten by higher organisms in the food chain.

In the dark corners, which are full of the Cave of Moville, the primary producers are the bacteria that convert carbon dioxide into living matter floating on the surface of cave waters. Primary production in the dark is driven by chemical energy produced by bacteria due to oxidation of sulfur compounds and ammonia in water. This process is called chemosynthesis.

An unusual underground ecosystem is isolated from the outside world for several million years. This hidden corner of the underground life is completely independent of the outside world. Cave air is filled with harmful gases, but it hosts a lot of strange animals. Methane and sulfur-oxidizing bacteria are the main primary producers supporting a complex food web, which includes various kinds of bacteria, fungi, adapted for life in complete darkness of invertebrates. These and other mysterious creatures, unknown to mankind, have long been a source of inspiration for naturalists, scientists, writers and filmmakers.