Scientists Discover Vast Ancient ‘Necropolis’ Teeming With Strange New Creatures
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The Abstract<br>Scientists Discover Vast Ancient ‘Necropolis’ Teeming With Strange New Creatures
Becky Ferreira
Jun 13, 2026<br>at 3:10 PM
A massive whale graveyard in the Indian Ocean contains the remains of hundreds of extinct whales dating back more than five million years, along with recent carcasses that support hotspots of seafloor life.
Fragmentary whale skeletal remains with stalked sea anemones, sponges, and sea stars. Photographs taken from the Chinese submersible Fendouzhe. Image: Global TREnD, IDSSE
Welcome back to the Abstract! Here are the studies this week that died in the deep, let nature call, tossed a galactic salad, and became interstellar voyeurs.<br>First, there’s a whale necropolis under the sea that is packed with ancient carcasses and teeming with new species. Then: a bygone world preserved in poop, the fruits of the universe’s labor, and a zoom lens for distant planets.<br>As always, for more of my work, check out my book First Contact: The Story of Our Obsession with Aliens, or subscribe to my personal newsletter the BeX Files.<br>A visit to the cetacean cemetery<br>Peng, Xiaotong; Zhou, Peng; Song, Xikun; Bianucci, Giovanni; Du. Mengran et al. “A 5.3-million-year-old deep-sea whale necropolis in the Diamantina Zone.” Nature.<br>Scientists have discovered an unprecedented underwater “necropolis” that contains the remains of hundreds of whales that died over the past five million years, scattered across 745 miles.<br>During dives in a deep sea submersible, researchers spotted whale bones submerged under more than four miles of the Diamantina Zone in the Indian Ocean, making this site the geographically largest, deepest, and oldest whale necropolis ever found. The graveyard is also teeming with species that may be “new to science” and subsist on these fortuitous “whale falls,” according to a new study.<br>“The discovery of whale-fall communities in the Diamantina Zone at depths exceeding 6,700 meters establishes one of the deepest known whale-fall ecosystems in the ocean, extending the known depth range of such habitats by more than 2,500 meters,” said researchers co-led by Xiaotong Peng of China’s Institute of Deep-sea Science and Engineering.<br>“This area has a deep and extensive accumulation comprising five modern natural whale-fall communities and 476 fossil cetaceans recorded,” the team said.<br>Peng and his colleagues first spotted the necropolis during dives in early 2023 using the Fendouzhe submersible, which is capable of bringing crews to depths of nearly seven miles. The team quickly realized they had tapped into a scientific motherlode, complete with an immense fossil archive of extinct animals—mostly deep-diving beaked whales—along with recent whale falls that still support thriving ecosystems of crustaceans, molluscs, worms, and microbes.<br>“Bone-eating worms, gastropods, vesicomyid bivalves and brittle stars dominate the megafauna (more than several centimetres in size), reaching local densities up to 2,840 individuals per square metre,” the team said. “Most recovered taxa may be new to science.”<br>As for why this vast necropolis formed, beaked whales may be attracted to these deep waters due to the abundance of prey sources, such as squid and fish. Some might accidentally dive so deep that they experience decompression sickness or fatal exhaustion, becoming bonus bodies for seafloor ecosystems. The sinking carcasses are then funnelled into the Diamantina Zone because of its V-shaped topography, serving up a figurative feast for scientists (and a literal one for marine biota).<br>Various remains in the necropolis. Image: IDSSE“As beaked whales are known primarily from rare strandings, their abundance, distribution and ecology remain poorly understood overall,” Peng and his colleagues concluded. “Our discovery of an accumulation of skeletal remains…provides an unparalleled source of information on these largely enigmatic cetaceans.”<br>Mariners have long dreaded ending up in Davy Jones’ locker, the proverbial resting ground of drowned sailors. It turns out that whales have a whole locker room down in the deep, where the bodies of countless leviathans blossom into fleeting hotspots of life.<br>In other news…<br>Bathroom blast from the past<br>Murchie, Tyler J. et al. “Ground squirrel coprolites preserve complex archives of ancient environmental DNA over 700,000 years.” Nature Communications.<br>The Klondike region of Canada’s Yukon territory is famous for the 19th-century gold rush that led hopeful prospectors to riches, ruin, and early graves. But now, scientists have found a very different type of valuable nugget in Klondike soil—ancient squirrel poops made by ancient squirrel bums as early as 700,000...