What is inside a grain of sand?

There are approximately 5 X 10^19 atoms in one grain of sand. As an actual number =50,000,000,000,000,000,000. That number is 50 Quintilian.

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What is in a grain of sand?
Are grains of sand solid?
Is a grain of sand a rock?
What is sand of made of?

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Artist/scientist/inventor Gary Greenberg combines his passions for art and science, creating dramatic photographic landscapes of everyday objects. Originally trained as a photographer and filmmaker, at the age of 33, he moved from Los Angeles to London, to earn a Ph.D. in biomedical research from University College London. Dr. Greenberg was an Assistant Professor at the University of Southern California during the 1980's, and in 1990, he began inventing and manufacturing high-definition three-dimensional light microscopes.

For the past six years, Greenberg has focused his microscopes on common objects, such as grains of sand, flowers, and food. These everyday objects take on a new reality when magnified hundreds of times. His images of sand make us realize that as we walk along a beach we are strolling on millions of years of biological and geological history. He believes that art is a window through which we can appreciate the miracles of nature.

Dr. Greenberg was a featured artist at the Science Museum of Minnesota. His exhibit, "Exploring the Microscopic World of Sand Grains" ran from May 2008 through January 2010. He has recently written a fascinating book about sand grains through the microscope: A Grain of Sand: Nature's Secret Wonder, Voyageur Press, Minneapolis, 2008. Visit his website at www.sandgrains.com

Dr. Gary Greenberg's book, "A Grain of Sand: Nature's Secret Wonder" is available from many booksellers and online retailers. The images on this page are a small sample of what is presented in the book.

Dr. Greenberg gave us a copy of his book for review and gave us permission to share these images with Geology.com visitors.

Just imagine, you are sitting on a sunny beach, contentedly letting the warm sand trickle through your fingers. Millions of sand grains. What you probably can't imagine: at the same time, billions upon billions of bacteria are also trickling through your fingers. Between 10,000 and 100,000 microorganisms live on each single grain of sand, as revealed in a study by researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen. This means that an individual grain of sand can have twice as many residents as, say, the city of Fairbanks, Alaska!

It has long been known that sand is a densely populated and active habitat. Now David Probandt and his colleagues have described the microbial community on a single grain of sand using modern molecular methods. To do this, they used samples taken from the southern North Sea, near the island of Helgoland, off the German coast.

The bacteria do not colonize the sand grains uniformly. While exposed areas are practically uncolonized, the bacteria bustle in cracks and depressions. "They are well protected there", explains Probandt. "When water flows around the grains of sand and they are swirled around, rubbing against each other, the bacteria are safe within these depressions." These sites may also act as hiding grounds from predators, who comb the surface of the sand grains in search of food.

Impressive diversity

However, the diversity of the bacteria, and not just their numbers, is impressive. "We found thousands of different species of bacteria on each individual grain of sand", says Probandt.

Some bacteria species and groups can be found on all investigated sand grains, others only here and there. "More than half of the inhabitants on all grains are the same. We assume that this core community on all sand grains displays a similar function", explains Probandt. "In principle, each grain has the same fundamental population and infrastructure." We can therefore really discover a great deal about the bacterial diversity of sand in general from investigating a single grain of sand.

Sandy coasts are enormous filters

Sand-dwelling bacteria play an important role in the marine ecosystem and global material cycles. Because these bacteria process, for example, carbon and nitrogen compounds from seawater and fluvial inflows, the sand acts as an enormous purifying filter. Much of what is flushed into the seabed by seawater doesn't come back out.

"Every grain of sand functions like a small bacterial pantry", explains Probandt. They deliver the necessary supplies to keep the carbon, nitrogen and sulphur cycles running. "Whatever the conditions may be that the bacterial community on a grain of sand is exposed to - thanks to the great diversity of the core community there is always someone to process the substances from the surrounding water."

More information: David Probandt et al. Microbial life on a sand grain: from bulk sediment to single grains, The ISME Journal (2017). DOI: 10.1038/ismej.2017.197

Journal information: ISME Journal

Provided by Max Planck Society

Citation: Every grain of sand is a metropolis for bacteria (2017, December 13) retrieved 3 December 2022 from https://phys.org/news/2017-12-grain-sand-metropolis-bacteria.html

This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

What is in a grain of sand?

Individual sand grains are the size of table salt grains (less than one millimeter in diameter), and resemble miniature gemstones when magnified. Sand from granitic mountains is often made of angular pieces of quartz, feldspar and mica.

Are grains of sand solid?

Sand is a solid that has the ability to be poured like a liquid and take the shape of its container. It is still a solid, as each individual grain of sand has a shape of its own and keeps that shape.

Is a grain of sand a rock?

Sand is an example of this. Sand is a kind of rock in transition. Sand grains form from a pre-existing rock that was destroyed by weathering and erosion. Sand grains become a sedimentary rock when they are cemented together.

What is sand of made of?

Sand is typically made mostly of varying amounts of material weathered from inland rocks (or seacliff material) and transported to the beach on the wind or in rivers, and/or shells and other hard parts precipitated out of the ocean water by marine organisms.