Exploring the Dark and Isolated Subterranean World

In a new IMAX film, a microbiologist and a cave expert work together to discover creatures that survive, and thrive, in the most extreme environments.

Published June 12, 2006

By Alison Snyder

Extreme adventurers and inquisitive scientists may seem an unlikely pair. But in Journey into Amazing Caves, the new IMAX film at the American Museum of Natural History, cave explorer Nancy Aulenbach and microbiologist Hazel Barton team up to explore a dark and isolated subterranean world.

Driven by the thrill of discovery, Aulenbach and Barton travel into caverns within the walls of an Arizona canyon, inside a glacier in Greenland, and beneath the rainforests of Mexico. While Aulenbach surveys the unmapped caves, Barton combs the surface of the walls, scouring for resilient microscopic organisms called extremophiles that she hopes will help cure human diseases.

Navigating Precarious Situations

Journey into Amazing Caves follows the two spelunkers through precarious situations. Hundreds of feet within the blue ice cathedral caves of Greenland, the ice shifts and the frozen walls and ceilings threaten to collapse. But despite these and other dangerous conditions, curiosity continues to push the explorers. Chemicals isolated from the creatures may be used to develop new medicines, though the film doesn’t go into detail about what types of compounds Barton is looking for and why she goes below the Earth’s surface to find them.

The film, narrated by Liam Neeson and featuring music from the Moody Blues, emphasizes that science itself is an exploration. Barton, who has discovered at least a dozen extremophile species throughout the world, is a cave explorer in her own right, as she stalks cave microorganisms. She talks about entering the black void — not of caves, but of scientific research — and of the satisfaction of discovery in the least expected corner.

In Journey into Amazing Caves, science is an exciting adventure. Armchair adventurers and aspiring scientists alike will want to travel into the Earth with Barton and Aulenbach to experience one of the bizarre places that science can take you.

Journey into Amazing Caves runs through September 1, 2006, at the American Museum of Natural History, 79th St. and Central Park West.

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