Scientists have long studied organisms that thrive around hydrothermal vents. But those native to areas known as cold seeps — where gases like methane and hydrogen sulfite leach from the seafloor at near-freezing temperatures — have been little studied.

An underwater voyage has revealed a network of creatures thriving at the bottom of deep-sea ocean trenches. In these extreme environments, the crushing

Scientists have filmed odd communities of life flourishing deeper in the ocean than ever before. The chemosynthesis-based life-forms get their energy from chemical reactions, powered by gases seeping out of faults on the seafloor.