Prehistoric forest buried in sea floor off Alabama coast could hold medicinal secrets

ALABAMA—Nearly 60,000 years ago, a bald cypress forest flourished on the banks of a prehistoric river near the Gulf of Mexico. Over time, the massive trees grew and died, their enormous trunks falling and becoming entombed in a protective covering of peat and sediment. These ancient forest remains were buried beneath the sea surface off the coast of Alabama, where they remained undisturbed for millennia. “Intensifying storms along the coast, however, have scoured the seafloor, beginning to expose this ancient submarine forest,” the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, said in a released statement. NOAA’s Office of Ocean Exploration has orchestrated a study with scientists from Northeastern University and the University of Utah to research the haunting site. One of the goals is to investigate if the prehistoric trees host undiscovered “compounds for medicine biotechnology,” which can be a basis for new types of antibiotics. NOAA video from the site shows it is alive with schools of fish. Marine animals and microorganisms that live on submerged wood and inside it are of particular interest. “The team’s focus is on bacteria found in wood-eating ‘shipworms,’ a type of clam,” NOAA staff said in a released statement. “These ‘termites of the sea’ convert wood into animal tissue,...