In April 2000 CSIRO scientists will mount a pioneering search of active volcanic vents on the seabed of the Manus Basin, north of Papua New Guinea.

Their aim is to discover new processes to help make Australia's $37 billion mineral export industry cleaner, greener, safer and more competitive.

A team of biologists and mineral researchers will sail from Cairns in the CSIRO research vessel Franklin in a search for "extremophile" microbes endowed with the natural ability to process minerals at high temperature.

The search will be conducted in an eerie landscape of smoking undersea chimneys that pump mineral fluids from deep in the earth's mantle into the surrounding ocean, shattered mineral columns resembling ancient ruins and hills mantled in snow-white carpets of bacteria and organic hydrates � compounds which can only exist at the extreme pressures of the deep sea.

The project was initiated by Dr Bruce Hobbs, Chief of CSIRO Exploration and Mining, Dr Rod Hill, Chief of CSIRO Minerals and Dr Dave Dekker of CSIRO Exploration & Mining. The team includes researchers from CSIRO Molecular Science, CSIRO Marine and CSIRO Land & Water.

Dr Ray Binns of CSIRO Exploration and Mining discovered these particular deposits and will lead the shipborne expedition, which is an international collaboration.

CSIRO is working closely with Papua New Guinea authorities to ensure the scientific and commercial interests of our nearest neighbour are protected. "Their scientists will directly benefit from participation in this expedition," says Dr Dekker.

Dr Hobbs says the goal is to find particular microbes that can be used to process minerals on dry land, and so develop more efficient and cleaner ways to win metals.

"When times are tough in the minerals industry, the miners who survive are the ones who can obtain pure minerals for the lowest cost.

"This trip is all about prospecting � but in this case, we're prospecting for microbes rather than actual minerals," he says. "To do so we're exploring exactly the same sort of system as the ones that formed Australia's mightiest orebodies, like Broken Hill and Mt Isa."

Dr Hobbs believes the deep sea bugs will enable Australia's miners to exploit lower grade ore deposits, extract metals more cheaply, clean up waste streams and may even improve mine safety.

"We call these bugs "extremophiles" because they live at the very upper end of the temperature and pressure conditions under which life is able to survive. They thrive in extreme situations," says biologist Dr Peter Franzmann of CSIRO Land & Water, a member of the team.

"Because these bugs operate at very high temperatures, around 100 degrees centigrade, they are extremely efficient at what they do � which includes extracting minerals like copper, gold, zinc, nickel, manganese and lead from the mineral-rich fluids spewing out of these hydrothermal vents."

Dr Franzmann, a world authority on microbes, says that the mineral-mining bugs are possibly relatives of some of the earliest forms of life to emerge on the planet, more than three billion years ago.

"Back then, conditions were similar to what we now see in these seafloor hydrothermal vents � high temperatures, intense pressure, lots of volcanic activity, darkness, with the nutrients to sustain life pouring out of the earth itself."

While similar mineral-eating bugs exist on land � and are used in some mining industries � the researchers expect these "extremophile" bacteria to be able to process mineral ores far more efficiently.

"The minerals are pouring out of the earth in fluids at temperatures of 300-400 degrees into the much colder sea water. The bugs live right where the superheated fluid meets the sea and the temperatures are between 80 and 110 degrees, at pressures around 150 atmospheres.

"We know they thrive down there. Some of the undersea landscapes are smothered in a mat of bacteria, dining on the mineral-rich sediments."

Dr Franzmann says that for a biologist, this is one of the most exciting projects he has been engaged in. "I love this stuff � it's almost totally unexplored. The potential for finding new and interesting kinds of life is enormous."

It is also at the opposite end of the spectrum to some of his best-known research, which took place in Antarctica, studying bugs which survive in salt lakes close to freezing.

It is known that the deep sea bugs can survive the trip to the surface and be grown under laboratory conditions. Researchers led by Dr Martin Houchin of CSIRO Minerals will then explore whether the bugs can be used in large scale mining operations as part of a process to extract metals from sulphide ores.