Basaltic rock primary resource
Naturally occurring basaltic geological material, represented here by six heterogeneous drill-core specimens from ICDP HSDP2, Hilo, Hawaii: basaltic flows, basaltic hyaloclastites and pillow basalts. This resource is not a single mineral species, pure basaltic glass, an elemental metal or a recovered commodity. The specimens contain different proportions of glass, primary silicates and secondary alteration phases. The source's manufactured BAS glasses are experimental analogues and are not the natural feed represented by this record. No constituent criticality designation is inherited.
Microbial & Biochemical Mechanisms (1)
Culture-associated colonization and aqueous element redistribution
other
Microbial
Associated Organisms:
Paraburkholderia fungorum (NCBITaxon:134537)
Living Paraburkholderia fungorum, named Burkholderia fungorum in the paper, grew and attached to natural basaltic rock surfaces in glucose-supplemented laboratory assays. Inoculated and uninoculated assays differed in aqueous elemental patterns, with both higher and lower release depending on the specimen, element, temperature and sampling time. Active microbial dissolution of the natural rock was not established separately from uptake of nutrients released during sterilization, abiotic dissolution and possible secondary-phase precipitation. This is conditional and negative weathering evidence, not demonstrated metal recovery.
Experimental Context & Analytical Limits:
The paper used collection strain ATCC BAA-463 obtained from DSMZ; DSMZ identifies the equivalent DSM 17061 and its fungus-associated provenance. It was not isolated from these HSDP2 specimens. Core samples supplied by the American Museum of Natural History repository comprised basaltic flows BF1 and BF2 at 604 and 2399 metres below sea level, hyaloclastites HC1 and HC2 at 732 and 1904 metres, and pillow basalts PB1 and PB2 at 2377 and 2385 metres. Most specimens had 60-90 volume percent glass; BF1 and HC1 instead had mainly cryptocrystalline matrices and minor interstitial glass. Olivine and clinopyroxene were present, with variable plagioclase, palagonitic alteration and secondary phillipsite. Gently crushed and repeatedly ultrasonically washed feed was 350 mg of 1-2 mm particles plus 150 mg of 0.2-1 mm particles per assay. Acid washing with 5 M HNO3 applied to the flasks, not to the rock. Rock underwent three 105-degree-C sterilization cycles, with cooling between cycles, followed by sterile water washing. Each 100 mL flask held 0.5 g rock and 50 mL M-minus-P medium containing, per litre, 0.2 g glucose, 0.04 g NH4Cl, 0.0005 g KCl and 0.0005 g MgSO4; initial pH was adjusted to 7 with ammonium hydroxide. Culture was precultured in tryptic soy broth and then phosphate-containing M-plus-P medium, washed three times in M-minus-P, and added as 50 microlitres to give approximately 10^5 cells/mL initially. Three biotic and three uninoculated parallels were incubated at each of 8 and 30 degrees C, 125 rpm, for 41 days. Samples of 6.5 mL were withdrawn on days 1, 3, 9, 28 and 41. Chemistry used 0.2-micrometre-filtered aliquots, acidification with 0.3 M HNO3 reagent and ICP-OES. The added acid volume and final sample acid concentration are not specified. Equation 1 corrects elemental amounts for serial withdrawal and expresses them relative to the initial 50 mL volume; plotted values are not extraction percentages or a closed feed-to-product mass balance. Controls shared preparation and medium but were not maintained at matched pH. No isolated metal product or industrial deployment was demonstrated.
The paper used collection strain ATCC BAA-463 obtained from DSMZ; DSMZ identifies the equivalent DSM 17061 and its fungus-associated provenance. It was not isolated from these HSDP2 specimens. Core samples supplied by the American Museum of Natural History repository comprised basaltic flows BF1 and BF2 at 604 and 2399 metres below sea level, hyaloclastites HC1 and HC2 at 732 and 1904 metres, and pillow basalts PB1 and PB2 at 2377 and 2385 metres. Most specimens had 60-90 volume percent glass; BF1 and HC1 instead had mainly cryptocrystalline matrices and minor interstitial glass. Olivine and clinopyroxene were present, with variable plagioclase, palagonitic alteration and secondary phillipsite. Gently crushed and repeatedly ultrasonically washed feed was 350 mg of 1-2 mm particles plus 150 mg of 0.2-1 mm particles per assay. Acid washing with 5 M HNO3 applied to the flasks, not to the rock. Rock underwent three 105-degree-C sterilization cycles, with cooling between cycles, followed by sterile water washing. Each 100 mL flask held 0.5 g rock and 50 mL M-minus-P medium containing, per litre, 0.2 g glucose, 0.04 g NH4Cl, 0.0005 g KCl and 0.0005 g MgSO4; initial pH was adjusted to 7 with ammonium hydroxide. Culture was precultured in tryptic soy broth and then phosphate-containing M-plus-P medium, washed three times in M-minus-P, and added as 50 microlitres to give approximately 10^5 cells/mL initially. Three biotic and three uninoculated parallels were incubated at each of 8 and 30 degrees C, 125 rpm, for 41 days. Samples of 6.5 mL were withdrawn on days 1, 3, 9, 28 and 41. Chemistry used 0.2-micrometre-filtered aliquots, acidification with 0.3 M HNO3 reagent and ICP-OES. The added acid volume and final sample acid concentration are not specified. Equation 1 corrects elemental amounts for serial withdrawal and expresses them relative to the initial 50 mL volume; plotted values are not extraction percentages or a closed feed-to-product mass balance. Controls shared preparation and medium but were not maintained at matched pH. No isolated metal product or industrial deployment was demonstrated.
Curated Evidence Points:
Support
Source:
stranghoener_2018
Figures 3 and 5 and Results pp6-9 support growth and surface association in the natural-rock cultures. Cell counts increased from the inoculation level, with glucose depletion; sterile controls retained glucose and had no cells detected by the reported microscopy. Cell counts were determined for only one of three parallels, whereas elemental and pH plots carry standard deviations for three. SEM observations were qualitative, with cells particularly on glassy and rough surfaces and scarce on adjacent smooth olivine; this does not establish an enzyme, siderophore pathway or direct-contact dissolution mechanism.
Partial
Source:
stranghoener_2018
Figure 4 and Results pp6-7 describe sample-dependent 30-degree-C patterns. HC2, PB1 and PB2 had lower aqueous Si, Mg, Ca, K, Na, P and Mn in cultures than in controls at day 1, while Fe and Al were reported higher in cultures. BF1 and HC1 instead generally had higher cultured Si, Mg, Ca, K, P and Mn, but higher Fe and Al in controls. BF2 was mixed, with many control concentrations higher. These comparisons are not a universal enhancement, and small Fe/Al differences are not given an independent significance test or digitized numerical extraction yield.
Partial
Source:
stranghoener_2018_s1
The original 8-degree-C plots retain strong specimen-specific differences and broadly reproduce lower cultured concentrations for several elements in HC2 and the pillow basalts. However, the main prose's statement that the same trends occur at 8 degrees C is not valid for every Fe/Al comparison: BF1 and HC1 show cultured Al above their controls at some times, unlike the generalized 30-degree-C description. BF2 endpoint Fe and Al error bars also overlap. Temperature-specific curves are not collapsed into a single directional or statistically significant effect.
Partial
Source:
stranghoener_2018
Discussion p12 explicitly states that active bacterial dissolution of the natural rocks was not clearly demonstrated: autoclaving released substantial nutrients from secondary minerals and subsequent washing was insufficient. Lower cultured solution concentrations can reflect uptake, while some falling control concentrations could reflect precipitation. Figure 5 and Results p9 report no major biotic versus abiotic surface-morphology difference apart from attached cells. The abstract's broader nutrient-depletion interpretation therefore does not establish active Fe bioleaching for all six natural specimens.
Partial
Source:
stranghoener_2018
Figure 3 shows strongly different pH trajectories among specimens and temperatures; culture acidification was not universal. Without matched-pH controls, proton effects cannot be separated quantitatively from other culture effects. Methods describe the medium as containing no Ca, but Results identify Ca as the exception to initially below-detection elements; an exactly Ca-free assay is not established. The Discussion groups HC2, PB1 and PB2 as above 30 square metres/g, although Methods give PB1 as 20.23 square metres/g. These source inconsistencies are not used to infer a uniform starting composition or surface area.
Context_only
Source:
stranghoener_2018
The separate synthetic-glass experiment used manufactured BAS1-BAS3 droplets, about 1.5 g in 50 mL medium, 30 degrees C, 80 rpm and 42 days, with two biotic and one abiotic flask. Figure 6 explicitly reports elemental measurements from only one parallel. Synthetic glasses differed in annealing/quenching and measured Fe(II)/total Fe fractions of 0.36, 0.37 and 0.86; residual stress itself was not measured. Their culture-associated Fe/Al release and altered cracks cannot be assigned as results of the six natural feeds. Table 1's synthetic composition and earlier-study average natural-glass composition are not bulk assays of these six core specimens. Iron oxidation as an energy metabolism, siderophore production and a closed elemental balance were not tested.
Context_only
Source:
stranghoener_2018_s2
The synthetic-glass pH graphic joins starting and endpoint values; Methods and Results explicitly say no intermediate samples were taken. The dashed lines do not demonstrate measured continuous acidification or supply matched-pH controls for either experiment.
Context_only
Source:
stranghoener_2018_s3
Supplementary surface images compare the three manufactured glasses and support the paper's qualitative colonization interpretation. They are neither independent biological replicates nor images of the natural core material and do not resolve a molecular mechanism or product phase.
Sources & References
-
stranghoener_2018: Stranghoener, Schippers, Dultz and Behrens (2018). Experimental Microbial Alteration and Fe Mobilization From Basaltic Rocks of the ICDP HSDP2 Drill Core, Hilo, Hawaii. Frontiers in Microbiology 9:1252. DOI 10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252; PMID 29963022; PMCID PMC6010528. Complete 17-page publisher PDF and JATS inspected, including Figures 1-8 and Table 1.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252/full (accessed 2026-10-11) -
stranghoener_2018_s1: Stranghoener et al. (2018), original supplementary Figure S1, version 1; natural-core elemental time courses at 8 degrees C. DOI 10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252.s001; Frontiers Figshare article 6529445, file 11997773, inspected as the complete original JPEG.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252.s001 (accessed 2026-10-11) -
stranghoener_2018_s2: Stranghoener et al. (2018), original supplementary Figure S2, version 1; synthetic-glass initial and final pH. DOI 10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252.s002; Frontiers Figshare article 6529451, file 11997779, complete JPEG inspected.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252.s002 (accessed 2026-10-11) -
stranghoener_2018_s3: Stranghoener et al. (2018), original supplementary Figure S3, version 1; synthetic-glass surface images. DOI 10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252.s003; Frontiers Figshare article 6529457, file 11997785, complete JPEG inspected.
https://doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2018.01252.s003 (accessed 2026-10-11) -
ncbi_fungorum: NCBI Taxonomy 134537, Paraburkholderia fungorum, species; current authority information page inspected 11 October 2026. Resolves the species, not an independently sequenced identity for the experimental culture.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Taxonomy/Browser/wwwtax.cgi?id=134537&mode=Info (accessed 2026-10-11) -
dsmz_17061: DSMZ catalogue DSM 17061, Paraburkholderia fungorum type strain; catalogue lists ATCC BAA-463 as an equivalent designation and Phanerochaete chrysosporium as its isolation source. Inspected 11 October 2026.
https://www.dsmz.de/collection/catalogue/details/culture/DSM-17061 (accessed 2026-10-11)
Curation History
| Timestamp | Curator | Action | Summary |
|---|---|---|---|
2026-10-11T18:21:52+00:00 |
codex (GPT-6; codex) | CREATE | Created a basaltic-rock primary-resource record from complete primary evidence and original supplements, preserving conditional and negative natural-rock results and separating manufactured-glass context. |
2026-10-11T18:28:47Z |
codex (GPT-6; codex) | EDIT | Corrected analytical acidification to identify 0.3 M HNO3 as the reagent concentration, leaving final sample acid molarity unspecified; addressed independent review finding acid-concentration and issue 107. |
Record source: data/records/basalt.yaml