title: Dasharatha

text: A maid of Queen Kaikeyi named Manthara convinced her that the throne of Maharaja Dasharatha belonged to her son Bharata, and that her stepson, crown prince Rama (the hero of the "Ramayana")— should be exiled from the kingdom. The ugly maid also reminded her of the promise made to her by Dasharatha when she saved him in the great war against the asuras, that she was promised 2 boons and she could use them to make Bharata king. By crowning Rama as king, Dasharatha would be doing an injustice to her, as she wanted Bharata to be king.


title: Dasharatha

text: Thus, after this conversation, Dasharatha was reminded by Kaikeyi about the two boons he had yet to fulfill for her. She talked of the time when she saved him from the demons during a celestial battle against Sambasura, an enemy of both Indra and Dasharatha. During a fierce battle between the two, the wheel of Dasharatha's chariot broke and Sambasura's arrow pierced the king's armor and lodged in his chest. Kaikeyi, who was acting as Dasharatha's charioteer, quickly repaired the broken wheel and then drove the chariot away from the battlefield. She nursed the wounded king back to health. Touched by her courage and timely service, Dasharatha offered her two boons. However, Kaikeyi chose to ask for those boons later, and King Dasharatha was obliged to fulfill them. Kaikeyi demanded that Bharata be crowned king and Rama be sent to the forest for fourteen years. Hearing this, Dasharatha fell into a swoon and passed the night in a pitiable condition in Kaikeyi's palace.


title: Dasharatha

text: After Rama's departure to the forest, Dasharatha lay in his bed with a wailing Kaushalya. He suddenly remembered an incident which had occurred in his past. He narrated to Kausalya about how, by accident, he had killed a young man named Shravana, mistaking him to be a deer. Dasharatha, who was then the crown prince, had gone hunting on the banks of River Sarayu. He was an expert in hunting by determining the direction of sound and heard the gurgle of an animal drinking water. Mistaking it to be deer, Dasharatha shot an arrow. He became mortified when he heard a human cry as the arrow found its target. Dasharatha hurried there to find a boy lying sprawled on the banks of the river with an arrow lodged in his chest. Dasharatha was aghast and profusely apologised to the young Shravana trying to revive and help him. The boy forgave Dasharatha for his unintentional, unrighteous act, and demanded that Dasharatha pull the arrow out of his chest. He also told him to take the pitcher of water to his blind parents, who must be waiting for him since they were thirsty because of all the travel. The boy succumbed to his injury. Dasharatha approached the blind couple and told them about their son's unfortunate death. The parents, grief-stricken, cursed Prince Dasharatha: "Just as we are suffering and dying due to the separation from our beloved son, you too shall have the same fate." Dasharatha concluded the chapter by saying that his end was near and the curse of Shravana's parents had taken effect.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: The character was based on writer Yukio Mishima, with whom he shares a last name. A number of staff members have considered him one of the franchise's strongest characters, which has led to debates about reducing the damage of some of his moves or removing together. Kazuya Mishima's devil form was created to bring unrealistic fighters into the series, but the incarnation has made few appearances. Several voice actors have portrayed Kazuya Mishima in video games and films related to "Tekken". In addition to appearances in spin-offs in the "Tekken" series, Kazuya also appears as a playable character in "Namco × Capcom", "Project X Zone 2", "Street Fighter X Tekken", "The King of Fighters All Star" and "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate".


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya Mishima has been positively received by critics. A number of websites have listed him as one of the best "Tekken" characters and one of the best characters in fighting games. Journalists have praised Kazuya Mishima's moves and dark characterization, which rivals that of his father. In contrast, critical reception of Kazuya Mishima's portrayal in films has been mixed, with critics finding him generic.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya was created by Takuji Kawano. "Tekken" producer Katsuhiro Harada created Kazuya Mishima as a corrupted character with a "pure dark side" as opposed to his father Heihachi Mishima, who Harada identified as having a more "human dark side". The franchise's design team referred to Kazuya and Nina Williams as "the soul [or] the cool part" of the original 1994 game. Kazuya's design and characterization was influenced by a variety of sources. Kazuya's family name was taken from author Yukio Mishima, who was also used a model for the character's physical appearance. Harada compared Kazuya to a yakuza, while artist Takayuki Yamaguchi based the character's "Tekken 6" costume on a robot. When describing Kazuya's personality, Harada cited him, along with Heihachi and Jin Kazama, as the violent characters of "Tekken"; he described the family as too quarrelsome. Denying claims that "Tekken"'s plot is too convoluted, Harada said that its basic story is a "simple" struggle among members of the Mishima family with other characters dragged into the conflict.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya's characterization has been influenced by his tragic past. Despite his initial formulaic traits often seen in fighting games in the first "Tekken" game similar to Ryu from "Street Fighter", Kazuya started showing signs of being a more of anti-stereotypical in the story; This was due to him becoming the villain from "Tekken 2", clashing with his father multiple times who was the originally the boss of the first "Tekken" game. Harada described Kazuya as focused on power; writing that the character addresses "different types of power", he explained: "that's kind of the story of Tekken and it's shown as the certain reality of people themselves rather than the idea law and order."


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Namco created "Tekken 7"'s storyline as a conclusion for Kazuya's struggle with Heihachi, though the company wanted the game's overall plot to be easily understood by newcomers. Harada also wanted the game to flesh out the characters' relationship and reveal why they are enemies. As part of the promotion for "Tekken 7", he said that either Kazuya or Heihachi would die in their final fight. The game's story mode includes a young Kazuya during the time Heihachi threw his son through a cliff following a fight; Harada said that the version of the character may be playable depending on fan demand. Harada called Kazuya's final fight with Heihachi a "major milestone in the storyline". Surprised by the length of the rivalry between the characters and "Tekken"'s popularity as a franchise, he felt it necessary to end in a fight to the death. Although Kazuya's rivalry with Heihachi ended in "Tekken 7", his relationship with his son Jin was left unresolved. Harada said that Jin's mother Jun Kazama would be "an important and essential element in talking about the story of Kazuya and Jin". Kazuya's relationship with Jun has been described as a common love story in regards to the interactions between a corrupted man and a goodnaturedly woman, respectively. While Jun was originally meant to be Kazuya's enemy in "Tekken 2", the two end up becoming lovers due to Jun finding the hidden caring side in Kazuya behind his devil persona.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya has appeared in games with "Street Fighter" characters. Kazuya fights Akuma during the end of "Tekken 7"'s story mode; Harada explained that the outcome of the fight was intentionally ambiguous, saying: "It's still a work in progress." He joked that a scene with either character winning or being killed could negatively affect Namco's relationship with Capcom, particularly Capcom CEO Kenzo Tsujimoto. Kazuya teamed up with Nina for the crossover game "Street Fighter X Tekken". When creating the illustrations for the characters, artist Kazuma Teshigawara said that he wanted them to complement one another. Nina was selected for the game instead of Anna Williams since her cold personality was similar to Kazuya's. The two characters were featured in the game's first trailer in a fight against "Street Fighter" characters Ryu and Ken Masters; the trailer was intended to attract the audience with the game's main feature. Completing the game with Kazuya and Nina unlocks an ending scene where Nina is revealed as an agent who escapes from Kazuya's forces. Artist Toshio Ohashi described the ending as the game's most cinematic due to similarities between the characters.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya's devil persona was created to meet Bandai Namco's request for more unrealistic characters in "Tekken", such as Kuma, in contrast with the "Virtua Fighter" fighting series. Devil Kazuya is unlockable as an alternate skin for Kazuya in the first game, though he appears as a separate character for "Tekken 2" and "Tekken Tag Tournament", including for a turn-based RPG game "Namco X Capcom" with similar moves to Kazuya. Kazuya's devil form represents a common element in fantasy but it stands out due to its being related to his genes, most notably Jin's own devil. The parallelism between Kazuya and Jin's devils were compared with the protagonists from the "Star Wars" films, Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker, respectively.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: The Devil fights with a laser, (also known as ), through his staff and a pair of wings were added later in the game's production. He was made more powerful, with his ten-hit combo easily taking down enemies. Realizing how powerful the character had become, Namco decided to balance his moves before the game's release. The devil form is said to be based on Go Nagai's manga "Devilman", where main character Akira Fudo develops a similar appearance. Although Kazuya's devil persona had first appeared as a single character, in "Tekken 4" he was removed from the cast; according to Harada, Kazuya (unlike Jin) embraced the powers of the devil. In homage to "Tekken: Blood Vengeance", Kazuya's devil form from the film was added as an alternate version of the character for "Tag Tournament 2".


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: From the first "Tekken" to "Tag Tournament", Kazuya has been voiced by Jōji Nakata. For the film "", writer Dai Satō added Jin and Kazuya as "visual eye-candy" similar to the Williams sisters (Nina and Anna). Satō wanted the pairs to be played together in the spin-off game "Tekken Tag Tournament 2", which relies on two-person teams. The story about the cursed Shin Kamiya is meant to give the audience the negative side of the Devil Gene which kills people experimented on and only Kazuya and his son are able to control it. The fight between Kazuya, Jin and Heihachi proved to be the most difficult part to make since it is used three motion captures and the choreography was difficult to adapt. Japanese voice actor Masanori Shinohara enjoyed Kazuya's role in the "Tekken" CGI film, and hoped his fans would see him in action. Shinohara said that Kazuya is a character the fandom enjoys due to his cruel demeanor.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya's fighting style is known as . Motion actor Ryu Narushima performed many of Kazuya's moves while he was working on Jin. Kazuya's moves include techniques often used by his father and Jin, but some are unique. According to Harada, Kazuya is one of the most difficult characters for a player to control. He saw Kazuya as a fun character due to how powerful he is. As a result, Harada felt that gamers who lose while playing as him feel ashamed. While fans often questioned him, saying that Lars Alexandersson was the strongest character to use in tournaments, Harada denied such claims, believing the Mishimas were far more powerful. GameSpy said that while Kazuya retained his previous moves in "Tekken 5", new additions over-powered the character to the point that players disliked using him. In the next game, GameSpy said that he was given launcher moves which (despite making the character stronger) could leave the player vulnerable.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Capcom recommended that players master Kazuya's combo, suggesting that it might turn the character into one of the most powerful in "Street Fighter X Tekken". Designing Kazuya's moves for this game, Capcom's Yoshinori Ono emailed Harada for ideas. Capcom soon received a "Tekken" guide and an email from Harada concerning Kazuya's moves. The character's combo had a glitch in this game, which Capcom patched. In the arcade game "Tekken 7 Fated Retribution", three of Kazuya's moves were patched to increase the damage they inflict. In making "Tekken"s transition to the Unreal Engine, the staff was concerned about leaving Kazuya's Electric Wind Godfist because it was considered over-powered in previous games. "Famitsu" recommended the character to skilled players, saying that some of his techniques have good potential—most notably , which makes him "Tekken 7" strongest character.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Before the events of the original "Tekken" game, Kazuya enters the King of Iron Fist Tournament to seek vengeance against his father Heihachi, who had thrown him off a cliff for unknown reasons. After defeating Lee Chaolan in the later stages of the tournament, he narrowly defeats Paul Phoenix in a furious battle that lasted for hours in the semi-finals and reaches the finals, where he battles Heihachi. Kazuya defeats Heihachi and drops him from the same cliff he was thrown from as a child. In "Tekken 2", Kazuya has taken over the Mishima Zaibatsu, which engages in illegal activities such as assassination, extortion, arms dealing, and the smuggling of protected species. Kazuya then announces a second King of Iron Fist Tournament. He is the game's final boss, and his alter-ego Devil is a hidden boss. The Devil is said to appear as an overpowered version of Kazuya who became one with him before the events of the first "Tekken" game. Heihachi reclaims the Mishima Zaibatsu by defeating Kazuya and throws him into the mouth of an erupting volcano. "Tekken 3" begins with Kazuya having impregnated Jun Kazama before his defeat by Heihachi.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya later returns as the main character in "Tekken 4", set 21 years after "Tekken 2". as Kazuya was revived by G Corporation (a genetics-company rival of the Mishima Zaibatsu), and allows the company to perform experiments on him to learn the nature of his Devil Gene. He vows revenge on Heihachi in the King of Iron Fist Tournament 4 and to extract the half of his Devil Gene in the body of his son, Jin Kazama. After defeating Lee Chaolan in the later stages of the tournament, Kazuya advances to Stage 7 where he was scheduled to fight his son, Jin is ambushed and captured by the Tekken Force and taken to Hon-Maru, a Mishima Dojo in the woods. Declared the default winner of Stage 7, Kazuya meets Heihachi at the final stage and questions him of Jin's disappearance. They clash and Heihachi emerges victorious. After the fight, instead of killing Kazuya outright, Heihachi leads Kazuya to Hon-Maru, a Mishima compound where Jin is held captive. Kazuya, influenced by Devil, knocks Heihachi out of the room with his psychic power and taunts Jin to wake him up. Jin defeats Kazuya and Heihachi in battle, but spares their lives.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: In "Tekken 5", Kazuya and Heihachi are assaulted by a squadron of Jack-4s (machines sent to assassinate them by G Corporation for the Tekken Force raid on the corporation's laboratories) after Jin's departure from Hon-Maru. Kazuya jumps out of Hon-Maru, letting Heihachi die. Vowing revenge on the traitors, Kazuya enters the King of Iron Fist Tournament 5. During the tournament, Kazuya crosses paths with Raven, who recognizes him after seeing him flying away from the Hon-Maru. Kazuya defeats Raven and interrogates him. When he makes Raven talk, Kazuya discovers that he was betrayed by G Corporation, and that something was awakened from under Hon-Maru. Kazuya realizes what Heihachi has done, and speculates that, in fact, it is his grandfather Jinpachi Mishima, who is somehow controlling the Zaibatsu now. In "Tekken 6", as the corporation's shadow head, he converts it into a military company which is the only opposition to the Mishima Zaibatsu (led by Jin), which has begun world conquest and declared war on several countries. The world sees G Corporation as its only savior, although Kazuya intends to kill Jin and dominate the world himself. He uses the company's influence to stop Jin from world domination. Kazuya meets his half-brother, Lars Alexandersson, before he can face Jin. They fight, and Kazuya is forced to leave.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: In "Tekken 7", Kazuya's mother is revealed as Kazumi Mishima, who died while trying to kill Heihachi. It is revealed that the young Kazuya sought revenge against his father but Heihachi knocked him out and threw him off the cliff as he noticed Kazuya inherited Kazumi's Devil Gene, which he finally confirmed it. In the story, Kazuya sends an army of Jack-6 robots to the Mishima dojo to eliminate Heihachi, who was confronted by the warrior Akuma moments before. Akuma says that he was sent by Kazumi to kill Kazuya and Heihachi, later confronting Kazuya at G Corporation's Millennium Tower and revealing his debt to Kazumi for saving his life from an unknown critical situation he was in. Surviving defeat by Akuma, Heihachi secretly captures images of the battle in which Kazuya transforms into his devil form. He broadcasts the images worldwide, exposing Kazuya's nature to undermine public trust in G Corporation as the Zaibatsu's opponents in the war. Heihachi blasts the Millennium Tower with a satellite in an attempt to destroy Kazuya and Akuma; Kazuya survives the attack, and destroys the satellite with a devil beam. Heihachi tells a reporter that Kazuya's devil gene came from his mother, Kazumi. In the final battle at the mouth of a volcano, Kazuya (the final boss of the story mode) transforms into his devil form, kills Heihachi, and throws him into a lava pit. Akuma resurfaces, having survived the previous blast. Kazuya transforms into his final devil form and they battle once more, with the outcome unknown. However, later after Heihachi's death, Jin, who recovers from coma thanks to Lars, Lee and Alisa, senses that Kazuya's devil remains active, in addition to Lee and Alisa's confirmation of Kazuya's terror of the world instead of ending the ongoing world war, with "Tekken 8" confirms his survival from his second encounter against Akuma.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya is the protagonist of the "Tekken" mobile game. He also appears in the non-canonical "Tekken Tag Tournament", confronting his son's devil form at the end. Kazuya's devil persona is also playable; the game ends with his taking Jun after defeating her alter ego. In the sequel, "Tekken Tag Tournament 2", Kazuya murders Jun to increase the power of his own devil form. As of this game onward, he can morph into Devil during gameplay with several new moves, instead of becoming a separate character, while "Tekken 7" can only be accessed at low health at cost of his Rage Mode. Kazuya also appears in "Tekken Revolution".


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: He appeared in devil form in the crossover strategy RPG "Namco × Capcom", with several other Namco and Capcom characters. Kazuya made a playable debut in human form—also transforming into his devil form—in the sequel of "Namco × Capcom" successor, "Project X Zone 2", teaming up with his son, Jin. Kazuya's image is downloadable content in Namco's "", and it appears as in "Taiko: Drum Master V Version". Although he does not appear, Kazuya is mentioned in the crossover fighting game "PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale".


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: He was one of the first characters featured in the Capcom's crossover fighting game, "Street Fighter X Tekken". In the debut trailer, Kazuya defeats Dan Hibiki before confronting "Street Fighter" mascot Ryu. He wants to seize Pandora's Box to control the devil gene, and hires Nina Williams to assist him. Kazuya appeared in CyberConnect2's tactical role-playing game "Full Bokko Heroes X" in his "Tekken 7" design, with a "chibi" look. He also appears in SNK's mobile phone game "The King of Fighters All Star". Kazuya makes a cameo appearance with Heihachi in the PlayStation 5 game, "Astro's Playroom". Kazuya appears as a DLC character along with Devil in "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate", released on June 29, 2021. Later, an amiibo figure of Kazuya has been confirmed at Nintendo Direct in October 2021. Kazuya appears as a playable character in "Fist of the North Star Legends ReVIVE".


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya is the protagonist in the 1998 original video animation (OVA) "". As in the "Tekken" game series, he is thrown off a cliff at a young age by Heihachi and saved by a deal with the devil. Kazuya becomes bent on revenge against Heihachi and enters the King of Iron Fist Tournament to confront him. Jun Kazama repeatedly implores him not to kill his father; after Kazuya defeats Heihachi, Jun destroys the devil's influence and restores his kind, compassionate self. He spares Heihachi's life and fathers Jin with Jun, but is not seen after the tournament's conclusion. Kazuya is voiced by Kazuhiro Yamaji in the original Japanese version and Adam Dudley in the English dub. He is also featured in the "Tekken Forever" and "Tekken Saga" comics. In the Titan comic, Kazuya briefly faces his son before assaulting the Mishima corporation.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Played by Ian Anthony Dale, he is the antagonist in the 2009 live-action film "Tekken". Kazuya is Heihachi's right-hand man at Tekken Corporation, hoping to take over his father's company. Impatient with Heihachi's compassion for Jin, he overthrows him and orders his execution (although Heihachi persuades the soldier to spare him). After Jin wins the tournament, Kazuya challenges him to a one-on-one duel. Initially defeating Jin, Kazuya is critically wounded; however, Jin refuses to kill him because of their blood relation and lets him live in shame. Japanese-American martial artist-actor Kane Kosugi played Kazuya in the 2014 prequel, "". An amnesiac after experiments by his father, Kazuya spends the movie fighting until he regains his memory.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: He is present in the CGI-animated film "", an alternate version of the events between "Tekken 5" and "Tekken 6"; Kazuya, an antagonist, faces his father and son and is defeated by the latter. Played by Kefi Abrikh, he appears in the live-action short film "Tekken Tag Tournament 2". His role in the franchise is also told in the novel, "Tekken: The Dark History of Mishima".


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Critical reception of the character has been largely positive, and he has often been listed as one of the best "Tekken" characters due to his appeal to gamers. "Complex" writers praised his dark backstory, saying that Kazuya became increasingly attractive over time, calling him the greatest character of the franchise. According to the magazine's website, Kazuya was one of the characters they wanted to see in "Super Smash Bros. Brawl 4". "FHM" compared him to "Street Fighter" Ryu, based on their popularity and representation of their respective series. Kazuya was also compared to his father, Heihachi, due to their similar natures and rivalry. Bandai Namco opened the Tekken Museum in Osaka in May 2012, where a statue of Kazuya and Jin performing a cross-counter was exhibited.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: A number of websites have noted on Kazuya's dark characterization in the games. "Den of Geek" enjoyed Kazuya's strong violence, such as his murder of his grandfather Jinpachi Mishima at the end of "Tekken 5". By "Tekken 4", "IGN" had praised his evil traits and intention to participate in the series' tournaments. Although "GamesRadar" noted that Kazuya had been disliked, they and other websites praised his transformation into a devil (enhancing his evil characteristics). "Kotaku" compared him with Heihachi and called him one of gaming's worst parents due to his antagonism to his son, Jin. PlayStation Universe ranked Kazuya and Heihachi among the top five rival pairs in "Tekken Tag Tournament 2" due to their relationship and power, describing them as one of the game's best tags. While enjoying his appearances in the series, "Den of Geek" felt Kazuya tends to lose most of his fights in the franchise.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya's alter ego, Devil Kazuya, was also praised. The difficulty in unlocking him in the series' first game did not prevent him from being listed as one of the best characters, similar to Kazuya. According to "GamesRadar", players wanted to see a fight between Devil Kazuya and Akuma in "Street Fighter X Tekken" due to the similarities in their design. In a Namco poll, Kazuya was the 18th-most-requested "Tekken" character to be playable in "Tekken X Street Fighter" (with 6.51 percent of the vote); 5.05 percent of the votes were cast for Devil, a separate voting option. In "Tekken 7", a bonus fight between Devil Kazuya and Akuma could be unlocked. Calling Devil Kazuya a difficult opponent, "Shacknews" and "Hobby Consolas" said that Akuma offered players a challenge; gamers needed to learn Devil Kazuya's moves to defeat him, resulting in the game's most difficult fight.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Websites have also noted Kazuya's moves, and his Lightning Screw Uppercut was listed by "GamesRadar" as one of the most satisfying uppercuts in gaming history. "Prima Games" praised Kazuya's Electric Wind God Fist for its impact on the enemy and possible player combos, and "ArcadeSushi" recommended it to players wanting to use the Mishima characters. Kazuya's Spinning Demon was performed by Eric Jacobus, attracting Harada's attention.


title: Kazuya Mishima

text: Kazuya's appearances outside the "Tekken" games have also been noted. Alex Henning of "The Fandom Post" stated that John Kim's Western comics adapted well Kazuya's personality in the series, finding it similar to his game incarnation. For the anime film "Tekken: The Motion Picture", Eric Sandroni of "Games Retrospect" called Kazuya one of the film's characters who seemed realistic. However, his English voice actor Adam Dudley has been criticized for his portrayal of the character. In a review of the first "Tekken" live-action film, "DVD Talk" had negative opinions on Kazuya and Heihachi's subplot regarding their rivalry. In "Kazuya's Revenge", "Manlu Movie" panned the actor's performance. "GameCrate" disliked his moves (calling them "noticeably generic") and his romantic relationship with Laura. Phil Wheat had mixed feelings about Kazuya's role, saying he was still appealing though longtime fans may dislike the changes to his character; Wheat described the teaser for a new film as engaging, and said that he enjoyed seeing Kazuya fight his son, Jin. "Games Retrospect" was harsher, calling Kazuya a "flat" character due to his generic traits. With an art piece, "Tekken" commemorated Kazuya's inclusion as a DLC character in "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate". "Screen Rant"s Scott Baird expressed disappointment at seeing yet another fighting game character. He went on to say that "Tekken" has a lot of fascinating characters, and claimed that Kazuya is one of the most uninteresting characters in "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate".


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: A hydrothermal vent is a fissure on the seabed from which geothermally heated water discharges. They are commonly found near volcanically active places, areas where tectonic plates are moving apart at mid-ocean ridges, ocean basins, and hotspots. Hydrothermal deposits are rocks and mineral ore deposits formed by the action of hydrothermal vents.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Hydrothermal vents exist because the earth is both geologically active and has large amounts of water on its surface and within its crust. Under the sea, they may form features called black smokers or white smokers. Relative to the majority of the deep sea, the areas around hydrothermal vents are biologically more productive, often hosting complex communities fueled by the chemicals dissolved in the vent fluids. Chemosynthetic bacteria and Archaea form the base of the food chain, supporting diverse organisms, including giant tube worms, clams, limpets and shrimp. Active hydrothermal vents are thought to exist on Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus, and it is speculated that ancient hydrothermal vents once existed on Mars.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Hydrothermal vents have been hypothesized to have been a significant factor to starting abiogenesis and the survival of primitive life.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Hydrothermal vents in the deep ocean typically form along the mid-ocean ridges, such as the East Pacific Rise and the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. These are locations where two tectonic plates are diverging and new crust is being formed.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The water that issues from seafloor hydrothermal vents consists mostly of seawater drawn into the hydrothermal system close to the volcanic edifice through faults and porous sediments or volcanic strata, plus some magmatic water released by the upwelling magma. In terrestrial hydrothermal systems, the majority of water circulated within the fumarole and geyser systems is meteoric water plus ground water that has percolated down into the thermal system from the surface, but it also commonly contains some portion of metamorphic water, magmatic water, and sedimentary formational brine that is released by the magma. The proportion of each varies from location to location.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In contrast to the approximately ambient water temperature at these depths, water emerges from these vents at temperatures ranging from up to as high as . Due to the high hydrostatic pressure at these depths, water may exist in either its liquid form or as a supercritical fluid at such temperatures. The critical point of (pure) water is at a pressure of 218 atmospheres.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: However, introducing salinity into the fluid raises the critical point to higher temperatures and pressures. The critical point of seawater (3.2 wt. % NaCl) is and 298.5 bars, corresponding to a depth of ~ below sea level. Accordingly, if a hydrothermal fluid with a salinity of 3.2 wt. % NaCl vents above and 298.5 bars, it is supercritical. Furthermore, the salinity of vent fluids have been shown to vary widely due to phase separation in the crust. The critical point for lower salinity fluids is at lower temperature and pressure conditions than that for seawater, but higher than that for pure water. For example, a vent fluid with a 2.24 wt. % NaCl salinity has the critical point at and 280.5 bars. Thus, water emerging from the hottest parts of some hydrothermal vents can be a supercritical fluid, possessing physical properties between those of a gas and those of a liquid.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Examples of supercritical venting are found at several sites. "Sister Peak" (Comfortless Cove Hydrothermal Field, , depth ) vents low salinity phase-separated, vapor-type fluids. Sustained venting was not found to be supercritical but a brief injection of was well above supercritical conditions. A nearby site, Turtle Pits, was found to vent low salinity fluid at , which is above the critical point of the fluid at that salinity. A vent site in the Cayman Trough named Beebe, which is the world's deepest known hydrothermal site at ~ below sea level, has shown sustained supercritical venting at and 2.3 wt% NaCl.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Although supercritical conditions have been observed at several sites, it is not yet known what significance, if any, supercritical venting has in terms of hydrothermal circulation, mineral deposit formation, geochemical fluxes or biological activity.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The initial stages of a vent chimney begin with the deposition of the mineral anhydrite. Sulfides of copper, iron, and zinc then precipitate in the chimney gaps, making it less porous over the course of time. Vent growths on the order of per day have been recorded. An April 2007 exploration of the deep-sea vents off the coast of Fiji found those vents to be a significant source of dissolved iron (see iron cycle).


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Some hydrothermal vents form roughly cylindrical chimney structures. These form from minerals that are dissolved in the vent fluid. When the superheated water contacts the near-freezing sea water, the minerals precipitate out to form particles which add to the height of the stacks. Some of these chimney structures can reach heights of 60 m. An example of such a towering vent was "Godzilla", a structure on the Pacific Ocean deep seafloor near Oregon that rose to 40 m before it fell over in 1996.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: A black smoker or deep sea vent is a type of hydrothermal vent found on the seabed, typically in the bathyal zone (with largest frequency in depths from 2,500 to 3,000 m), but also in lesser depths as well as deeper in the abyssal zone. They appear as black, chimney-like structures that emit a cloud of black material. Black smokers typically emit particles with high levels of sulfur-bearing minerals, or sulfides. Black smokers are formed in fields hundreds of meters wide when superheated water from below Earth's crust comes through the ocean floor (water may attain temperatures above 400 °C). This water is rich in dissolved minerals from the crust, most notably sulfides. When it comes in contact with cold ocean water, many minerals precipitate, forming a black, chimney-like structure around each vent. The deposited metal sulfides can become massive sulfide ore deposits in time. Some black smokers on the Azores portion of the Mid Atlantic Ridge are extremely rich in metal content, such as Rainbow with 24,000 μM concentrations of iron.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Black smokers were first discovered in 1979 on the East Pacific Rise by scientists from Scripps Institution of Oceanography during the RISE Project. They were observed using the deep submergence vehicle ALVIN from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Now, black smokers are known to exist in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, at an average depth of . The most northerly black smokers are a cluster of five named Loki's Castle, discovered in 2008 by scientists from the University of Bergen at 73°N, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between Greenland and Norway. These black smokers are of interest as they are in a more stable area of the Earth's crust, where tectonic forces are less and consequently fields of hydrothermal vents are less common. The world's deepest known black smokers are located in the Cayman Trough, 5,000 m (3.1 miles) below the ocean's surface.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: White smoker vents emit lighter-hued minerals, such as those containing barium, calcium and silicon. These vents also tend to have lower-temperature plumes probably because they are generally distant from their heat source.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Black and white smokers may coexist in the same hydrothermal field, but they generally represent proximal (close) and distal (distant) vents to the main upflow zone, respectively. However, white smokers correspond mostly to waning stages of such hydrothermal fields, as magmatic heat sources become progressively more distant from the source (due to magma crystallization) and hydrothermal fluids become dominated by seawater instead of magmatic water. Mineralizing fluids from this type of vent are rich in calcium and they form dominantly sulfate-rich (i.e., barite and anhydrite) and carbonate deposits.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Life has traditionally been seen as driven by energy from the sun, but deep-sea organisms have no access to sunlight, so biological communities around hydrothermal vents must depend on nutrients found in the dusty chemical deposits and hydrothermal fluids in which they live. Previously, Benthic oceanographers assumed that vent organisms were dependent on marine snow, as deep-sea organisms are. This would leave them dependent on plant life and thus the sun. Some hydrothermal vent organisms do consume this "rain", but with only such a system, life forms would be sparse. Compared to the surrounding sea floor, however, hydrothermal vent zones have a density of organisms 10,000 to 100,000 times greater.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The hydrothermal vents are recognized as a type of chemosynthetic based ecosystems (CBE) where primary productivity is fuelled by chemical compounds as energy sources instead of light (chemoautotrophy). Hydrothermal vent communities are able to sustain such vast amounts of life because vent organisms depend on chemosynthetic bacteria for food. The water from the hydrothermal vent is rich in dissolved minerals and supports a large population of chemoautotrophic bacteria. These bacteria use sulfur compounds, particularly hydrogen sulfide, a chemical highly toxic to most known organisms, to produce organic material through the process of chemosynthesis.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The vents' impact on the living environment goes beyond the organisms that lives around them, as they act as a significant source of iron in the oceans, providing iron for the phytoplankton.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The ecosystem so formed is reliant upon the continued existence of the hydrothermal vent field as the primary source of energy, which differs from most surface life on Earth, which is based on solar energy. However, although it is often said that these communities exist independently of the sun, some of the organisms are actually dependent upon oxygen produced by photosynthetic organisms, while others are anaerobic.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The chemosynthetic bacteria grow into a thick mat which attracts other organisms, such as amphipods and copepods, which graze upon the bacteria directly. Larger organisms, such as snails, shrimp, crabs, tube worms, fish (especially eelpout, cutthroat eel, ophidiiforms and "Symphurus thermophilus"), and octopuses (notably "Vulcanoctopus hydrothermalis"), form a food chain of predator and prey relationships above the primary consumers. The main families of organisms found around seafloor vents are annelids, pogonophorans, gastropods, and crustaceans, with large bivalves, vestimentiferan worms, and "eyeless" shrimp making up the bulk of nonmicrobial organisms.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Siboglinid tube worms, which may grow to over tall in the largest species, often form an important part of the community around a hydrothermal vent. They have no mouth or digestive tract, and like parasitic worms, absorb nutrients produced by the bacteria in their tissues. About 285 billion bacteria are found per ounce of tubeworm tissue. Tubeworms have red plumes which contain hemoglobin. Hemoglobin combines with hydrogen sulfide and transfers it to the bacteria living inside the worm. In return, the bacteria nourish the worm with carbon compounds. Two of the species that inhabit a hydrothermal vent are "Tevnia jerichonana", and "Riftia pachyptila". One discovered community, dubbed "Eel City", consists predominantly of the eel "Dysommina rugosa". Though eels are not uncommon, invertebrates typically dominate hydrothermal vents. Eel City is located near Nafanua volcanic cone, American Samoa.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In 1993, already more than 100 gastropod species were known to occur in hydrothermal vents. Over 300 new species have been discovered at hydrothermal vents, many of them "sister species" to others found in geographically separated vent areas. It has been proposed that before the North American plate overrode the mid-ocean ridge, there was a single biogeographic vent region found in the eastern Pacific. The subsequent barrier to travel began the evolutionary divergence of species in different locations. The examples of convergent evolution seen between distinct hydrothermal vents is seen as major support for the theory of natural selection and of evolution as a whole.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Although life is very sparse at these depths, black smokers are the centers of entire ecosystems. Sunlight is nonexistent, so many organisms, such as archaea and extremophiles, convert the heat, methane, and sulfur compounds provided by black smokers into energy through a process called chemosynthesis. More complex life forms, such as clams and tubeworms, feed on these organisms. The organisms at the base of the food chain also deposit minerals into the base of the black smoker, therefore completing the life cycle.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: A species of phototrophic bacterium has been found living near a black smoker off the coast of Mexico at a depth of . No sunlight penetrates that far into the waters. Instead, the bacteria, part of the Chlorobiaceae family, use the faint glow from the black smoker for photosynthesis. This is the first organism discovered in nature to exclusively use a light other than sunlight for photosynthesis.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: New and unusual species are constantly being discovered in the neighborhood of black smokers. The Pompeii worm "Alvinella pompejana", which is capable of withstanding temperatures up to , was found in the 1980s, and a scaly-foot gastropod "Chrysomallon squamiferum" in 2001 during an expedition to the Indian Ocean's Kairei hydrothermal vent field. The latter uses iron sulfides (pyrite and greigite) for the structure of its dermal sclerites (hardened body parts), instead of calcium carbonate. The extreme pressure of 2,500 m of water (approximately 25 megapascals or 250 atmospheres) is thought to play a role in stabilizing iron sulfide for biological purposes. This armor plating probably serves as a defense against the venomous radula (teeth) of predatory snails in that community.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In March 2017, researchers reported evidence of possibly the oldest forms of life on Earth. Putative fossilized microorganisms were discovered in hydrothermal vent precipitates in the Nuvvuagittuq Belt of Quebec, Canada, that may have lived as early as 4.280 billion years ago, not long after the oceans formed 4.4 billion years ago, and not long after the formation of the Earth 4.54 billion years ago.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Hydrothermal vent ecosystems have enormous biomass and productivity, but this rests on the symbiotic relationships that have evolved at vents. Deep-sea hydrothermal vent ecosystems differ from their shallow-water and terrestrial hydrothermal counterparts due to the symbiosis that occurs between macroinvertebrate hosts and chemoautotrophic microbial symbionts in the former. Since sunlight does not reach deep-sea hydrothermal vents, organisms in deep-sea hydrothermal vents cannot obtain energy from the sun to perform photosynthesis. Instead, the microbial life found at hydrothermal vents is chemosynthetic; they fix carbon by using energy from chemicals such as sulfide, as opposed to light energy from the sun. In other words, the symbiont converts inorganic molecules (HS, CO, O) to organic molecules that the host then uses as nutrition. However, sulfide is an extremely toxic substance to most life on Earth. For this reason, scientists were astounded when they first found hydrothermal vents teeming with life in 1977. What was discovered was the ubiquitous symbiosis of chemoautotrophs living in (endosymbiosis) the vent animals' gills; the reason why multicellular life is capable to survive the toxicity of vent systems. Scientists are therefore now studying how the microbial symbionts aid in sulfide detoxification (therefore allowing the host to survive the otherwise toxic conditions). Work on microbiome function shows that host-associated microbiomes are also important in host development, nutrition, defense against predators, and detoxification. In return, the host provides the symbiont with chemicals required for chemosynthesis, such as carbon, sulfide, and oxygen.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In the early stages of studying life at hydrothermal vents, there were differing theories regarding the mechanisms by which multicellular organisms were able to acquire nutrients from these environments, and how they were able to survive in such extreme conditions. In 1977, it was hypothesized that the chemoautotrophic bacteria at hydrothermal vents might be responsible for contributing to the diet of suspension-feeding bivalves.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Finally, in 1981, it was understood that giant tubeworm nutrition acquisition occurred as a result of chemoautotrophic bacterial endosymbionts. As scientists continued to study life at hydrothermal vents, it was understood that symbiotic relationships between chemoautotrophs and macrofauna invertebrate species was ubiquitous. For instance, in 1983, clam gill tissue was confirmed to contain bacterial endosymbionts; in 1984 vent bathymodiolid mussels and vesicomyid clams were also found to carry endosymbionts.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: However, the mechanisms by which organisms acquire their symbionts differ, as do the metabolic relationships. For instance, tubeworms have no mouth and no gut, but they do have a "trophosome", which is where they deal with nutrition and where their endosymbionts are found. They also have a bright red plume, which they use to uptake compounds such as O, HS, and CO, which feed the endosymbionts in their trophosome. Remarkably, the tubeworms hemoglobin (which incidentally is the reason for the bright red color of the plume) is capable of carrying oxygen without interference or inhibition from sulfide, despite the fact that oxygen and sulfide are typically very reactive. In 2005, it was discovered that this is possible due to zinc ions that bind the hydrogen sulfide in the tubeworms hemoglobin, therefore preventing the sulfide from reacting with the oxygen. It also reduces the tubeworms tissue from exposure to the sulfide and provides the bacteria with the sulfide to perform chemoautotrophy. It has also been discovered that tubeworms can metabolize CO in two different ways, and can alternate between the two as needed as environmental conditions change.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In 1988, research confirmed thiotrophic (sulfide-oxidizing) bacteria in "Alvinochonca hessleri", a large vent mollusk. In order to circumvent the toxicity of sulfide, mussels first convert it to thiosulfate before carrying it over to the symbionts. In the case of motile organisms such as alvinocarid shrimp, they must track oxic (oxygen-rich) / anoxic (oxygen-poor) environments as they fluctuate in the environment.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Organisms living at the edge of hydrothermal vent fields, such as pectinid scallops, also carry endosymbionts in their gills, and as a result their bacterial density is low relative to organisms living nearer to the vent. However, the scallop's dependence on the microbial endosymbiont for obtaining their nutrition is therefore also lessened.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Furthermore, not all host animals have endosymbionts; some have episymbionts—symbionts living on the animal as opposed to inside the animal. Shrimp found at vents in the Mid-Atlantic Ridge were once thought of as an exception to the necessity of symbiosis for macroinvertebrate survival at vents. That changed in 1988 when they were discovered to carry episymbionts. Since then, other organisms at vents have been found to carry episymbionts as well, such as Lepetodrilis fucensis.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Furthermore, while some symbionts reduce sulfur compounds, others are known as "methanotrophs" and reduce carbon compounds, namely methane. Bathmodiolid mussels are an example of a host that contains methanotrophic endosymbionts; however, the latter mostly occur in cold seeps as opposed to hydrothermal vents.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: While chemosynthesis occurring at the deep ocean allows organisms to live without sunlight in the immediate sense, they technically still rely on the sun for survival, since oxygen in the ocean is a byproduct of photosynthesis. However, if the sun were to suddenly disappear and photosynthesis ceased to occur on our planet, life at the deep-sea hydrothermal vents could continue for millennia (until the oxygen was depleted).


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The chemical and thermal dynamics in hydrothermal vents makes such environments highly suitable thermodynamically for chemical evolution processes to take place. Therefore, thermal energy flux is a permanent agent and is hypothesized to have contributed to the evolution of the planet, including prebiotic chemistry.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Günter Wächtershäuser proposed the iron-sulfur world theory and suggested that life might have originated at hydrothermal vents. Wächtershäuser proposed that an early form of metabolism predated genetics. By metabolism he meant a cycle of chemical reactions that release energy in a form that can be harnessed by other processes.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: It has been proposed that amino acid synthesis could have occurred deep in the Earth's crust and that these amino acids were subsequently shot up along with hydrothermal fluids into cooler waters, where lower temperatures and the presence of clay minerals would have fostered the formation of peptides and protocells. This is an attractive hypothesis because of the abundance of CH (methane) and NH (ammonia) present in hydrothermal vent regions, a condition that was not provided by the Earth's primitive atmosphere. A major limitation to this hypothesis is the lack of stability of organic molecules at high temperatures, but some have suggested that life would have originated outside of the zones of highest temperature. There are numerous species of extremophiles and other organisms currently living immediately around deep-sea vents, suggesting that this is indeed a possible scenario.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Experimental research and computer modeling indicate that the surfaces of mineral particles inside hydrothermal vents have similar catalytic properties to enzymes and are able to create simple organic molecules, such as methanol (CHOH) and formic acid (HCOH), out of the dissolved CO in the water.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: It is thought that alkaline hydrothermal vents (white smokers) might be more suitable for emerging life than black smokers due to their pH conditions.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: However, this view of deep sea hydrothermal vents as an ideal environment is controversial since wet-dry cycles and exposure to UV light are absent at these environments, which promote the formation of membranous vesicles and synthesis of many biomolecules. The ionic concentrations of hydrothermal vents differs from the intracellular fluid within the majority of life. They have instead suggested that terrestrial freshwater environments are more likely to be an ideal environment for the formation of early cells. While proponents of the deep sea hydrothermal vent hypothesis suggest mineral gels or mineral cavities to be an alternative compartment for biomolecules, as well as catalytic Fe(Ni)S compartments.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In biochemistry, reactions with CO and H produce precursors to biomolecules that are also produced from the acetyl-CoA pathway and Krebs cycle which would support an origin of life at deep sea alkaline vents. Acetyl phosphate produced from the reactions would phosphorylate ADP to ATP. The high concentration of potassium within most life forms could be readily explained that protocells might have had sodium-hydrogen antiporters. If cells originated at these environments, they would have been autotrophs with a Wood-Ljungdahl pathway and amino acid fermentations would emerge at low H partial pressures, where heterotrophs would have then originated.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: At the beginning of his 1992 paper "The Deep Hot Biosphere", Thomas Gold referred to "ocean vents" in support of his theory that the lower levels of the earth are rich in living biological material that finds its way to the surface. He further expanded his ideas in the book "The Deep Hot Biosphere".


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: An article on "abiogenic hydrocarbon production" in the February 2008 issue of Science journal used data from experiments at the Lost City hydrothermal field to report how the abiotic synthesis of low molecular mass hydrocarbons from mantle derived carbon dioxide may occur in the presence of ultramafic rocks, water, and moderate amounts of heat.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In 1949, a deep water survey reported anomalously hot brines in the central portion of the Red Sea. Later work in the 1960s confirmed the presence of hot, 60 °C (140 °F), saline brines and associated metalliferous muds. The hot solutions were emanating from an active subseafloor rift. The highly saline character of the waters was not hospitable to living organisms. The brines and associated muds are currently under investigation as a source of mineable precious and base metals.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In June 1976, scientists from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography obtained the first evidence for submarine hydrothermal vents along the Galápagos Rift, a spur of the East Pacific Rise, on the "Pleiades II" expedition, using the Deep-Tow seafloor imaging system. In 1977, the first scientific papers on hydrothermal vents were published by scientists from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography; research scientist Peter Lonsdale published photographs taken from deep-towed cameras, and PhD student Kathleen Crane published maps and temperature anomaly data. Transponders were deployed at the site, which was nicknamed "Clam-bake", to enable an expedition to return the following year for direct observations with the DSV "Alvin".


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Chemosynthetic ecosystems surrounding the Galápagos Rift submarine hydrothermal vents were first directly observed in 1977, when a group of marine geologists funded by the National Science Foundation returned to the Clambake sites. The principal investigator for the submersible study was Jack Corliss of Oregon State University. Corliss and Tjeerd van Andel from Stanford University observed and sampled the vents and their ecosystem on February 17, 1977, while diving in the DSV "Alvin", a research submersible operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). Other scientists on the research cruise included Richard (Dick) Von Herzen and Robert Ballard of WHOI, Jack Dymond and Louis Gordon of Oregon State University, John Edmond and Tanya Atwater of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dave Williams of the U.S. Geological Survey, and Kathleen Crane of Scripps Institution of Oceanography. This team published their observations of the vents, organisms, and the composition of the vent fluids in the journal Science. In 1979, a team of biologists led by J. Frederick Grassle, at the time at WHOI, returned to the same location to investigate the biological communities discovered two year earlier.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: High temperature hydrothermal vents, the "black smokers", were discovered in spring 1979 by a team from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography using the submersible "Alvin". The RISE expedition explored the East Pacific Rise at 21° N with the goals of testing geophysical mapping of the sea floor with the "Alvin" and finding another hydrothermal field beyond the Galápagos Rift vents. The expedition was led by Fred Spiess and Ken Macdonald and included participants from the U.S., Mexico and France. The dive region was selected based on the discovery of sea floor mounds of sulfide minerals by the French CYAMEX expedition in 1978. Prior to dive operations, expedition member Robert Ballard located near-bottom water temperature anomalies using a deeply towed instrument package. The first dive was targeted at one of those anomalies. On Easter Sunday April 15, 1979 during a dive of "Alvin" to 2,600 meters, Roger Larson and Bruce Luyendyk found a hydrothermal vent field with a biological community similar to the Galápagos vents. On a subsequent dive on April 21, William Normark and Thierry Juteau discovered the high temperature vents emitting black mineral particle jets from chimneys; the black smokers. Following this Macdonald and Jim Aiken rigged a temperature probe to "Alvin" to measure the water temperature at the black smoker vents. This observed the highest temperatures then recorded at deep sea hydrothermal vents (380±30 °C). Analysis of black smoker material and the chimneys that fed them revealed that iron sulfide precipitates are the common minerals in the "smoke" and walls of the chimneys.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In 2005, Neptune Resources NL, a mineral exploration company, applied for and was granted 35,000 km of exploration rights over the Kermadec Arc in New Zealand's Exclusive Economic Zone to explore for seafloor massive sulfide deposits, a potential new source of lead-zinc-copper sulfides formed from modern hydrothermal vent fields. The discovery of a vent in the Pacific Ocean offshore of Costa Rica, named the Medusa hydrothermal vent field (after the serpent-haired Medusa of Greek mythology), was announced in April 2007. The Ashadze hydrothermal field (13°N on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, elevation -4200 m) was the deepest known high-temperature hydrothermal field until 2010, when a hydrothermal plume emanating from the Beebe site (, elevation -5000 m) was detected by a group of scientists from NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. This site is located on the 110 km long, ultraslow spreading Mid-Cayman Rise within the Cayman Trough.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In early 2013, the deepest known hydrothermal vents were discovered in the Caribbean Sea at a depth of almost .


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Oceanographers are studying the volcanoes and hydrothermal vents of the Juan de Fuca mid ocean ridge where tectonic plates are moving away from each other.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Hydrothermal vents and other geothermal manifestations are currently being explored in the Bahía de Concepción, Baja California Sur, Mexico.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Hydrothermal vents are distributed along the Earth's plate boundaries, although they may also be found at intra-plate locations such as hotspot volcanoes. As of 2009 there were approximately 500 known active submarine hydrothermal vent fields, with about half visually observed at the seafloor and the other half suspected from water column indicators and/or seafloor deposits. The InterRidge program office hosts a global database for the locations of known active submarine hydrothermal vent fields.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Hydrothermal vents, in some instances, have led to the formation of exploitable mineral resources via deposition of seafloor massive sulfide deposits. The Mount Isa orebody located in Queensland, Australia, is an excellent example. Many hydrothermal vents are rich in cobalt, gold, copper, and rare earth metals essential for electronic components. Hydrothermal venting on the Archean seafloor is considered to have formed Algoma-type banded iron formations which have been a source of iron ore.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Recently, mineral exploration companies, driven by the elevated price activity in the base metals sector during the mid-2000s, have turned their attention to extraction of mineral resources from hydrothermal fields on the seafloor. Significant cost reductions are, in theory, possible.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: In countries such as Japan where mineral resources are primarily derived from international imports, there is a particular push for the extraction of seafloor mineral resources. The world's first "large-scale" mining of hydrothermal vent mineral deposits was carried out by Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation (JOGMEC) in August - September, 2017. JOGMEC carried out this operation using the Research Vessel Hakurei. This mining was carried out at the 'Izena hole/cauldron' vent field within the hydrothermally active back-arc basin known as the Okinawa Trough which contains 15 confirmed vent fields according to the InterRidge Vents Database.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Two companies are currently engaged in the late stages of commencing to mine seafloor massive sulfides (SMS). Nautilus Minerals is in the advanced stages of commencing extraction from its Solwarra deposit, in the Bismarck Archipelago, and Neptune Minerals is at an earlier stage with its Rumble II West deposit, located on the Kermadec Arc, near the Kermadec Islands. Both companies are proposing using modified existing technology. Nautilus Minerals, in partnership with Placer Dome (now part of Barrick Gold), succeeded in 2006 in returning over 10 metric tons of mined SMS to the surface using modified drum cutters mounted on an ROV, a world first. Neptune Minerals in 2007 succeeded in recovering SMS sediment samples using a modified oil industry suction pump mounted on an ROV, also a world first.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Potential seafloor mining has environmental impacts including dust plumes from mining machinery affecting filter-feeding organisms, collapsing or reopening vents, methane clathrate release, or even sub-oceanic land slides.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: There also exist potential environmental effects from the tools needed for mining of these hydrothermal vent ecosystems; including noise pollution and anthropogenic light. Hydrothermal vent system mining would require the use of both submerged mining tools on the seafloor including remotely operated underwater vehicles (ROVs), as well surface support vessels on the ocean surface. Inevitably through the operation of these machines some level of noise will be created, which presents a problem for hydrothermal vent organisms because as they are up to 12,000 feet below the surface of the ocean they experience very little sound. As a result of this, these organisms have evolved to have highly sensitive hearing organs, so if there is a sudden increase in noise, such as that created by mining machinery, there is potential to damage these auditory organs and harm the vent organisms. It is also important to consider that many studies have been able to show that a large percent of benthic organisms communicate using very low frequency sounds; therefore, increasing ambient noise levels on the seafloor could potentially mask communication between the organisms, and alter behavioural patterns. Similar to how deep sea SMS mining tools create noise pollution, they also create anthropogenic light sources on the seafloor (from mining tools) and the ocean surface (from surface support vessels). Organisms at these hydrothermal vent systems are in the aphotic zone of the ocean, and have adapted to very low light conditions. Studies on deep sea shrimp have shown the potential for flood lights used on the sea floor used in studying the vent systems to cause permanent retinal damage; warranting further research into potential risk to other vent organisms. On top of the risk presented to deep sea organisms, the surface support vessels use nocturnal anthropogenic lighting. Research has shown that this type of lighting on the ocean surface can disorient seabirds and cause fallout; where they fly toward the anthropogenic light and become exhausted or collide with man-made objects resulting in injury or death. There is both aquatic and land organism consideration to be made when evaluating the environmental effects of hydrothermal vent mining.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: There are three mining waste processes known as the side case sediment release, dewatering process and sediment shift or disturbance, that would be expected with the deep-sea mining processes and could result in the accumulation of a sediment plume or cloud which, can lead to substantial environmental implications. The side cast sediment release is a process that would occur at the seafloor and would involve the move of material at the seafloor by the submerged ROV’s and would most likely contribute to the formation of the sediment plume at the seafloor. The idea of side cast release is that the ROV’s would discard economically invaluable material to the side of the mining sight before transporting the sulfide material to the supporting vessel at the surface. The goal of this process is to reduce the amount of material being transferred to the surface and minimize land-based. The dewatering process is a mining waste process that would most likely contribute to the formation of the sediment plume from the surface. The method of mine waste disposal releases water from onboard the ship that may have been obtained during the extraction and transport of the material from the seafloor to the surface. The third contribution to the formation of the sediment plume or cloud would be sediment disturbance and release. This mining waste contribution is mainly associated with the mining activity on the seafloor associated with the movement of the ROV’s and the destructive disturbance of the seafloor as part of the mining process itself.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The two main environmental concerns as a result of these waste mining processes that contribute to the formation of the sediment plume would be, the release of heavy metals and increased amounts of sediment released. The release of heavy metals is mainly associated with the dewatering process that would take place onboard the ship at the surface of the water. The main problem associated with dewatering is it is not just the release of seawater re-entering the water column. Heavy metals such as copper and cobalt that would be sourced from the material extracted on the seafloor are also mixed in with the water that is released into the water column. The first environmental concern associated with the release of heavy metals is that it has the potential to change ocean chemistry within that localized water column area. The second concern would be that some of the heavy metals that could be released can have some leave of toxicity to not only organisms inhabiting that area but also organisms passing through the mining site area. The concerns surrounding increased sediment release is mainly related to the other two mining waste processes, side cast sediment and seafloor sediment disturbance. The main environmental concerns would be smother organisms below as a result of redistributing large amounts of sediment to other areas on the seafloor which, could potentially threaten the population of organisms inhabiting the area. Redistribution of large quantities of sediment can also effect the feeding and gas exchange processes between organisms also posing a serious threat to the population. Finally, these processes can also increase the sedimentation rate on the seafloor resulting is a predicted minimum of 500 m per every 1-10 km.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: A large amount of work is currently being engaged in by both the above-mentioned companies to ensure that potential environmental impacts of seafloor mining are well understood and control measures are implemented, before exploitation commences. However, this process has been arguably hindered by the disproportionate distribution of research effort among vent ecosystems: the best studied and understood hydrothermal vent ecosystems are not representative of those targeted for mining.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Attempts have been made in the past to exploit minerals from the seafloor. The 1960s and 70s saw a great deal of activity (and expenditure) in the recovery of manganese nodules from the abyssal plains, with varying degrees of success. This does demonstrate however that recovery of minerals from the seafloor is possible, and has been possible for some time. Mining of manganese nodules served as a cover story for the elaborate attempt in 1974 by the CIA to raise the sunken Soviet submarine "K-129", using the Glomar Explorer, a ship purpose built for the task by Howard Hughes. The operation was known as Project Azorian, and the cover story of seafloor mining of manganese nodules may have served as the impetus to propel other companies to make the attempt.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: The conservation of hydrothermal vents has been the subject of sometimes heated discussion in the oceanographic community for the last 20 years. It has been pointed out that it may be that those causing the most damage to these fairly rare habitats are scientists. There have been attempts to forge agreements over the behaviour of scientists investigating vent sites but although there is an agreed code of practice there is no formal international and legally binding agreement.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Conservation of hydrothermal vent ecosystems after the fact of mining of an active system would depend on the recolonization of chemosynthetic bacteria, and therefore the continuation of the hydrothermal vent fluid as it is the main hydrothermal energy source. It is very difficult to get an idea of the effects of mining on the hydrothermal vent fluid because there have been no large scale studies done. However, there have been studies on the recolonization of these vent ecosystems after volcanic destruction. From these we can develop insight on the potential effects of mining destruction, and have learned it took 3-5 years for bacteria to recolonize the area, and around 10 years for megafauna to return. It was also found that there was a shift in the composition of species in the ecosystem compared to before the destruction, and the presence of immigrant species. Though further research into the effects of sustained seafloor SMS mining on species recolonization is needed.


title: Hydrothermal vent

text: Common methods to find out the ages of hydrothermal vents are to date the sulfide (e.g., pyrite) and sulphate minerals (e.g., baryte). Common dating methods include radiometric dating and electron spin resonance dating. Different dating methods have their own limitations, assumptions and challenges. General challenges include the high purity of extracted minerals required for dating, the age range of each dating method, heating above closure temperatures erasing ages of older minerals, and multiple episodes of mineral formation resulting in a mixture of ages. In environments with multiple phases of mineral formation, generally, electron spin resonance dating gives the average age of the bulk mineral while radiometric dates are biased to the ages of younger phases because of the decay of parent nuclei. These explain why different methods can give different ages to the same sample and why the same hydrothermal chimney can have samples with different ages.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: The Dewan Rakyat (English: 'House of Representatives'; ) is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament, the federal legislature of Malaysia. The chamber and its powers are established by Article 44 of the Constitution of Malaysia. The Dewan Rakyat sits in the Houses of Parliament in Kuala Lumpur, along with the Dewan Negara, the upper house.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: The Dewan Rakyat is a directly elected body consisting of 222 members known as Members of Parliament (MPs). Members are elected by first-past-the-post voting with one member from each federal constituency. Members hold their seats until the Dewan Rakyat is dissolved, the term of which is constitutionally limited to five years after an election. The number of seats each state or territory is entitled to is fixed by Article 46 of the Constitution.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: While the concurrence of both chambers of Parliament is normally necessary for legislation to be enacted, the Dewan Rakyat holds significantly more power in practice; the Dewan Negara very rarely rejects bills that have been passed by the Dewan Rakyat and the Dewan Rakyat can bypass the Dewan Negara if it refuses to pass a specific law twice, with at least one year in between. The Cabinet is solely responsible to the Dewan Rakyat, and the prime minister only has to maintain the support of the lower house.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: Members are referred to as "Members of Parliament" ("MPs") or "" () in Malay. The term of office is as long as the member wins in the elections.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: A member of the Dewan Rakyat must be at least 21 years of age and must not concurrently be a member of the Dewan Negara. The presiding officer of the Dewan Rakyat is the Speaker, who is elected at the beginning of each Parliament or after the vacation of the post, by the MPs. Two Deputy Speakers are also elected, and one of them sits in place of the Speaker when he is absent. The Dewan Rakyat machinery is supervised by the Clerk of the House who is appointed by the King; he may only be removed from office through the manner prescribed for judges or by mandatory retirement at age 60.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: As of the 2018 general election, the Dewan Rakyat has 222 elected members. Members are elected from federal constituencies drawn by the Election Commission. Constituency boundaries are redrawn every ten years based on the latest census.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: Each Dewan Rakyat lasts for a maximum of five years, after which a general election must be called. In the general election, voters select a candidate to represent their constituency in the Dewan Rakyat. The first-past-the-post voting system is used; the candidate who gains the most votes wins the seat.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: Before a general election can be called, the King must first dissolve Parliament on the advice of the Prime Minister. According to the Constitution, the Yang di-Pertuan Agong has the right at his own discretion to either grant or withhold consent to dissolve the parliament.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: Parliament is the legislative branch of the federal government and is responsible for passing, amending and repealing primary legislation. These are known as Acts of Parliament.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: Members of Parliament possess parliamentary privilege and are permitted to speak on any subject without fear of censure outside Parliament; the only body that can censure an MP is the House Committee of Privileges. Immunity is effective from the moment a member of Parliament is sworn in, and only applies when that member has the floor; it does not apply to statements made outside the House. An exception is made by the Sedition Act passed by Parliament in the wake of the 13 May racial riots in 1969. Under the Act, all public discussion of repealing certain Articles of the Constitution dealing with Bumiputra privileges such as Article 153 is illegal. This prohibition is extended to all members of both houses of Parliament. Members of Parliament are also forbidden from criticising the King and judges.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: The executive government, comprising the Prime Minister and his Cabinet, is usually drawn from members of Parliament; most of its members are typically members of the Dewan Rakyat. After a general election or the resignation or death of a Prime Minister, the King selects the Prime Minister, who is the head of government but constitutionally subordinate to him, from the Dewan Rakyat. In practice, this is usually the leader of the largest party in Parliament. The Prime Minister then submits a list containing the names of members of his Cabinet, who will then be appointed as Ministers by the King. Members of the Cabinet must also be members of Parliament. If the Prime Minister loses the confidence of the Dewan Rakyat, whether by losing a no-confidence vote or failing to pass a budget, he must either advise the King to dissolve Parliament and hold a general election or submit his resignation to the King. The King has the discretion to grant or withhold consent to the dissolution. If consent is withheld, the government must resign and the King would appoint a new Prime Minister that has the support of the majority of members of Parliament. The Cabinet formulates government policy and drafts bills, meeting in private. Its members must accept "collective responsibility" for the decisions the Cabinet makes, even if some members disagree with it; if they do not wish to be held responsible for Cabinet decisions, they must resign. Although the Constitution makes no provision for it, there is also a Deputy Prime Minister, who is the "de facto" successor of the Prime Minister should he die or be otherwise incapacitated.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: A proposed act of law begins its life when a particular government minister or ministry prepares a first draft with the assistance of the Attorney-General's Department. The draft, known as a bill, is then discussed by the Cabinet. If it is agreed to submit it to Parliament, the bill is distributed to all MPs. It then goes through three readings before the Dewan Rakyat. The first reading is where the minister or his deputy submits it to Parliament. At the second reading, the bill is discussed and debated by MPs. At the third reading, the minister or his deputy formally submit it to a vote for approval. A simple majority is usually required to pass the bill, but in certain cases, such as amendments to the constitution, a two-thirds majority is required. Should the bill pass, it is sent to the Dewan Negara, where the three readings are carried out again. The Dewan Negara may choose not to pass the bill, but this only delays its passage by a month, or in some cases, a year; once this period expires, the bill is considered to have been passed by the house.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: If the bill passes, it is presented to the Yang di-Pertuan Agong who has 30 days to consider the bill. Should he disagree with it, he returns it to Parliament with a list of suggested amendments. Parliament must then reconsider the bill and its proposed amendments and return it to the King within 30 days if they pass it again. The King then has another 30 days to give the royal assent; otherwise, it passes into law. The law does not take effect until it is published in the Government Gazette.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: The government attempts to maintain top secrecy regarding bills debated; MPs generally receive copies of bills only a few days before they are debated, and newspapers are rarely provided with copies of the bills before they are debated. In some cases, such as a 1968 amendment to the Constitution, an MP may be presented with a bill to be debated on the same day it is tabled, and all three readings may be carried out that day itself. In rare circumstances, the government may release a White paper containing particular proposals that will eventually be incorporated into a bill; this has been done for legislation such as the Universities and University Colleges Act.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: Although the process above assumes only the government can propose bills, there also exists a process for private member's bills. However, unlike most other legislatures following the Westminster system, few members of Parliament actually introduce bills. To present a private member's bill, the member in question must seek the leave of the House in question to debate the bill before it is moved. Originally, it was allowed to debate the bill in the process of seeking leave, but this process was discontinued by an amendment to the Standing Orders of the Dewan Rakyat. It is also possible for members of the Dewan Negara to initiate bills; however, only cabinet ministers are permitted to move finance-related bills, which must be tabled in the Dewan Rakyat.


title: Dewan Rakyat

text: It is often alleged that legislation proposed by the opposition parties, which must naturally be in the form of a private member's bill, is not seriously considered by Parliament. Some have gone as far as to claim that the rights of members of Parliament to debate proposed bills have been severely curtailed by incidents such as an amendment of the Standing Orders that permitted the Speaker to amend written copies of MPs' speeches before they were made. Nevertheless, it is admitted by some of these critics that "government officials often face sharp questioning in Parliament, although this is not always reported in detail in the press."


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: The Kurgan hypothesis (also known as the Kurgan theory, Kurgan model, or steppe theory) is the most widely accepted proposal to identify the Proto-Indo-European homeland from which the Indo-European languages spread out throughout Europe and parts of Asia. It postulates that the people of a Kurgan culture in the Pontic steppe north of the Black Sea were the most likely speakers of the Proto-Indo-European language (PIE). The term is derived from the Russian "kurgan" (), meaning tumulus or burial mound.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: The steppe theory was first formulated by Otto Schrader (1883) and V. Gordon Childe (1926), then systematized in the 1950s by Marija Gimbutas, who used the term to group various prehistoric cultures, including the Yamnaya (or Pit Grave) culture and its predecessors. In the 2000s, David Anthony instead used the core Yamnaya culture and its relationship with other cultures as a point of reference.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: Gimbutas defined the Kurgan culture as composed of four successive periods, with the earliest (Kurgan I) including the Samara and Seroglazovo cultures of the Dnieper–Volga region in the Copper Age (early 4th millennium BC). The people of these cultures were nomadic pastoralists, who, according to the model, by the early 3rd millennium BC had expanded throughout the Pontic–Caspian steppe and into Eastern Europe.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: Recent genetics studies have demonstrated that populations bearing specific Y-DNA haplogroups and a distinct genetic signature expanded into Europe and South Asia from the Pontic-Caspian steppe during the third and second millennia BC. These migrations provide a plausible explanation for the spread of at least some of the Indo-European languages, and suggest that the alternative Anatolian hypothesis, which places the Proto-Indo-European homeland in Neolithic Anatolia, is less likely to be correct.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: Arguments for the identification of the Proto-Indo-Europeans as steppe nomads from the Pontic–Caspian region had already been made in the 19th century by the German scholars, Theodor Benfey (1869) and (1870), followed notably by Otto Schrader (1883, 1890). Theodor Poesche had proposed the nearby Pinsk Marshes. In his standard work about PIE and to a greater extent in a later abbreviated version, Karl Brugmann took the view that the urheimat could not be identified exactly by the scholarship of his time, but he tended toward Schrader's view. However, after Karl Penka's 1883 rejection of non-European PIE origins, most scholars favoured a Northern European origin.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: The view of a Pontic origin was still strongly supported, including by the archaeologists V. Gordon Childe and Ernst Wahle. One of Wahle's students was Jonas Puzinas, who became one of Marija Gimbutas's teachers. Gimbutas, who acknowledged Schrader as a precursor, painstakingly marshalled a wealth of archaeological evidence from the territory of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc that was not readily available to Western scholars, revealing a fuller picture of prehistoric Europe.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: When it was first proposed in 1956, in "The Prehistory of Eastern Europe, Part 1", Gimbutas's contribution to the search for Indo-European origins was an interdisciplinary synthesis of archaeology and linguistics. The Kurgan model of Indo-European origins identifies the Pontic–Caspian steppe as the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) urheimat, and a variety of late PIE dialects are assumed to have been spoken across this region. According to this model, the Kurgan culture gradually expanded to the entire Pontic–Caspian steppe, Kurgan IV being identified with the Yamnaya culture of around 3000 BC.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: The mobility of the Kurgan culture facilitated its expansion over the entire region and is attributed to the domestication of the horse followed by the use of early chariots. The first strong archaeological evidence for the domestication of the horse comes from the Sredny Stog culture north of the Azov Sea in Ukraine, and would correspond to an early PIE or pre-PIE nucleus of the 5th millennium BC. Subsequent expansion beyond the steppes led to hybrid, or in Gimbutas's terms "kurganized" cultures, such as the Globular Amphora culture to the west. From these kurganized cultures came the immigration of Proto-Greeks to the Balkans and the nomadic Indo-Iranian cultures to the east around 2500 BC.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: Gimbutas defined and introduced the term "Kurgan culture" in 1956 with the intention of introducing a "broader term" that would combine Sredny Stog II, Pit Grave, and Corded ware horizons (spanning the 4th to 3rd millennia in much of Eastern and Northern Europe). The Kurgan archaeological culture or cultural horizon comprises the various cultures of the Pontic–Caspian steppe in the Copper Age to Early Bronze Age (5th to 3rd millennia BC), identified by similar artifacts and structures, but subject to inevitable imprecision and uncertainty. The eponymous kurgans (mound graves) are only one among several common features.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: The Kurgan hypothesis describes the initial spread of Proto-Indo-European during the 5th and 4th millennia BC. As used by Gimbutas, the term "kurganized" implied that the culture could have been spread by no more than small bands who imposed themselves on local people as an elite. This idea of PIE and its daughter languages diffusing east and west without mass movement proved popular with archaeologists in the 1970s (the "pots-not-people" paradigm). The question of further Indo-Europeanization of Central and Western Europe, Central Asia and Northern India during the Bronze Age is beyond the scope of the Kurgan hypothesis, and far more uncertain than the events of the Copper Age, and subject to some controversy. The rapidly developing fields of archaeogenetics and genetic genealogy since the late 1990s have not only confirmed a migratory pattern out of the Pontic Steppe at the relevant time but also suggest the possibility that the population movement involved was more substantial than earlier anticipated and invasive.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: Gimbutas believed that the expansions of the Kurgan culture were a series of essentially-hostile military incursions in which a new warrior culture imposed itself on the peaceful, matrilinear, and matrifocal (but not matriarchal) cultures of "Old Europe" and replaced it with a patriarchal warrior society, a process visible in the appearance of fortified settlements and hillforts and the graves of warrior-chieftains:


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: In her later life, Gimbutas increasingly emphasized the authoritarian nature of this transition from the egalitarian society centered on the nature/earth mother goddess (Gaia) to a patriarchy worshipping the father/sun/weather god (Zeus, Dyaus).


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: J. P. Mallory (in 1989) accepted the Kurgan hypothesis as the "de facto" standard theory of Indo-European origins, but he distinguished it from an implied "radical" scenario of military invasion. Gimbutas's actual main scenario involved slow accumulation of influence through coercion or extortion, as distinguished from general raiding shortly followed by conquest:


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: In the 2000s, Alberto Piazza and Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza tried to align the Anatolian hypothesis with the steppe theory. According to Piazza, "[i]t is clear that, genetically speaking, peoples of the Kurgan steppe descended at least in part from people of the Middle Eastern Neolithic who immigrated there from Anatolia." According to Piazza and Cavalli-Sforza (2006), the Yamna-culture may have been derived from Middle Eastern Neolithic farmers who migrated to the Pontic steppe and developed pastoral nomadism. Wells agrees with Cavalli-Sforza that there is ""some" genetic evidence for migration from the Middle East." Nevertheless, the Anatolian hypothesis is incompatible with the linguistic evidence.


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: David Anthony's "The Horse, the Wheel and Language" describes his "revised steppe theory". He considers the term "Kurgan culture" so imprecise as to be useless, and instead uses the core Yamnaya culture and its relationship with other cultures as points of reference. He points out:


title: Kurgan hypothesis

text: He does not include the Maykop culture among those that he considers to be Indo-European-speaking and presumes instead that they spoke a Caucasian language.


title: Political colour

text: Political colours are colours used to represent a political ideology, movement or party, either officially or unofficially. It is the intersection of colour symbolism and political symbolism.


title: Political colour

text: Parties in different countries with similar ideologies sometimes use similar colours. As an example the colour red symbolises left-wing ideologies in many countries (leading to such terms as "Red Army" and "Red Scare"), while the colour blue is often used for conservatism, the colour yellow is most commonly associated with liberalism and right-libertarianism, and Green politics is named after the ideology's political colour.


title: Political colour

text: The political associations of a given colour vary from country to country, and there are exceptions to the general trends. For example, red has historically been associated with monarchy or the Church, but over time gained association with leftist politics, while the United States differs from other countries in that conservatism is associated with red and liberalism with blue.


title: Political colour

text: Politicians making public appearances will often identify themselves by wearing rosettes, flowers, ties or ribbons in the colour of their political party.


title: Political colour

text: Black is primarily associated with anarchism (see anarchist symbolism). Black can be seen as a lack of colour, anarchism as a lack of a state. It is used in contrast of national flags, to instead represent universal anarchism. Black is used to a lesser extent to represent fascism (see blackshirts and Schutzstaffel) and jihadism (see Black Standard).


title: Political colour

text: The colours black and red have been used by anarchists since at least the late 1800s when they were used on cockades by Italian anarchists in the 1874 Bologna insurrection, and in 1877 when anarchists entered the Italian town Letino carrying red and black flags to promote the First International. During the Spanish civil war the CNT used a diagonally half strip of black and red, with black representing anarchism and red representing the labour movement and the worker movement. The flag was quickly adopted by other anarchists, with the second colour used to distinguish specific anarchist philosophies: anarcho pacifism with white, green anarchism with green, anarcho-syndicalism and anarcho-communism with red, mutualism with orange, and anarcho-capitalism with yellow, while black alone typically represents Anarchism without adjectives.


title: Political colour

text: During the golden age of piracy, the black flags of pirates such as Blackbeard and Calico Jack became popular symbols of piracy. The flags represented death and no quarter to those who did not surrender. The black flag of the jolly roger, used by Calico Jack, turned into a popular and recognizable symbol of pirates, particularly of pirates of the Americas. The skull and bones also became a hazardous symbol to display poisons such as cyanide, Zyklon B and other toxic substances. The black flag of piracy would later influence the symbols of anarchism, such as the symbols of the Makhnovshchina and the Kronstadt rebellion. The rise of internet piracy led to the symbols of the golden age of piracy becoming widely adopted, becoming the symbols of pirate sites such as the Pirate bay. Black becoming a colour to represent pirate parties.


title: Political colour

text: Blue is usually associated with centre-right or conservative parties, originating from its use by the Tories (predecessor of the Conservative Party) in the United Kingdom. Blue is used by many international organisations of centre right and conservative parties, such as the International Democrat Union, the Democrat Union of Africa, the Asia Pacific Democrat Union, the Caribbean Democrat Union (together with red), the European Democrat Union, the European People's Party, the European Conservatives and Reformists Party.


title: Political colour

text: Brown has been associated with Nazism, and in particular the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) because of the Sturmabteilung (SA), whose members were called "brownshirts". They were modeled on Benito Mussolini's blackshirts, and the colour was chosen because many brown uniforms intended for the colonial troops in Germany's African colonies were cheaply available after the end of World War I. In Europe and elsewhere, the colour brown is sometimes used to refer to fascists in general.


title: Political colour

text: Green is the colour for both environmentalist and Islamic political parties and movements (see green in Islam).


title: Political colour

text: Magenta is a colour that tends to replace yellow for liberal and centrist parties and organisations in Europe. It is not to be confused with the socialist or social democratic use of the colour pink.


title: Political colour

text: Orange is the traditional colour of the Christian democratic political ideology and most Christian democratic political parties, which are based on Catholic social teaching and/or neo-Calvinist theology. Christian democratic political parties came to prominence in Europe and the Americas after World War II. Orange less frequently represents various kinds of populist parties. Such is the case in Austria, Germany, France, Portugal, Switzerland, Finland, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Turkey.


title: Political colour

text: Pink is sometimes used by social democratic parties, such as in France and Portugal. The more traditional colour of social democracy is red (because social democracy is descended from the democratic socialist movement), but some countries have large social democratic parties alongside large socialist or communist parties, so that it would be confusing for them all to use red. In such cases, social democrats are usually the ones who give up red in favor of a different colour. Pink is often chosen because it is seen as a softer, less aggressive version of red, in the same way that social democracy is more centrist and capitalistic than socialism.


title: Political colour

text: Although purple has some older associations with monarchism, it is the most prominent colour that is not traditionally connected to any major contemporary ideology. As such, it is sometimes used to represent a mix of different ideologies, or new protest movements that are critical of all previously-existing minor parties.


title: Political colour

text: Red is often associated with the left, especially socialism and communism. The oldest symbol of socialism (and by extension communism) is the Red Flag, which dates back to the French Revolution in the 18th century and the revolutions of 1848. Before this nascence, the colour red was generally associated with monarchy or the Church due to the symbolism and association of Christ's blood. The colour red was chosen to represent the blood of the workers who died in the struggle against capitalism. All major socialist and communist alliances and organisations—including the First, Second, Third and Fourth Internationals—used red as their official colour. The association between the colour red and communism is particularly strong. Communists use red much more often and more extensively than other ideologies use their respective traditional colours.


title: Political colour

text: Saffron is traditionally associated with Hinduism, Hindutva and the Hindu nationalist movement. Saffron was chosen because in Hinduism, the deep saffron colour is associated with sacrifice, religious abstinence, quest for light and salvation. Saffron or "Bhagwa" is the most sacred colour for the Hindus and is often worn by Sanyasis who have left their home in search of the ultimate truth.


title: Sharmaji Namkeen

text: Sharmaji Namkeen () is a 2022 Indian Hindi-language comedy drama film written and directed by debutante Hitesh Bhatia, co-written by Supratik Sen, and produced by Ritesh Sidhwani and Farhan Akhtar under Excel Entertainment as well as Honey Trehan and Abhishek Chaubey under MacGuffin Pictures. Marking the first instance in cinematic history of two actors playing the same character without sharing screen space, it stars Rishi Kapoor in his posthumous appearance as the titular protagonist following his demise on 30 April 2020, and Paresh Rawal also playing the titular character, with Rawal finishing Kapoor's remaining scenes. Juhi Chawla, Suhail Nayyar, Isha Talwar and debutante Taaruk Raina feature in pivotal roles. Following its completion, the film premiered on Amazon Prime Video on 31 March 2022.


title: Sharmaji Namkeen

text: Brij Gopal Sharma a.k.a. Sharmaji, a middle-class widower, is asked to retire by his company Madhuban Home Appliances at the age of 58, much to his annoyance. A healthy and lively man, he lives with his sons Sandeep "Rinku" Sharma and Vinayak "Vincy" Sharma at his rather small home in Subhash Nagar, West Delhi. Rinku is in a relationship with his colleague Urmi Kaul, and the two of them plan on buying a flat in Gurgaon after they get married. Vincy is a final year B.Com student who is passionate about dance. Sharmaji is averse to the idea of moving away from his home of the past many years, causing Rinku to hide the fact that he is finalizing his apartment deal.