Integrated Approaches to Explore the Biosphere Inhabiting the Deep Subsurface of the Illinois Basin, USA

The majority of microbial life inhabits formation water and mineral surfaces within the subsurface of our planet. The subsurface microbial biosphere therefore plays a dynamic role in a variety of biogeochemical processes. The cross-disciplinary studies have been performed on the indigenous microbial communities inhabiting the Cambrian Mt. Simon Sandstone of the Illinois Basin. This is a high porosity and permeability hydrocarbon-free geological formation that is analogous to many oil and gas reservoirs around the world. This work combined subsurface microbiology (omics-based and culture-based), geochemistry, and mineralogy to quantitatively track subsurface microbial ecology, microbe-water-rock interactions, and their associated metabolic potentials. The Mt. Simon therefore serves as a uniquely well-suited and accessible natural subsurface environment to understand biogeochemical processes that range from the molecular-tobasin scale, with results directly applicable to analogous oil fields.