What does over 2 billion years old water taste like?

If you came across water that was more than two billion years old, what would you do? Would you be tempted to drink it right away? After discovering the planet's oldest water, one scientist actually did that.

Apparently, in 2016, a team from the University of Toronto, led by Professor Barbara Sherwood Lollar, made an amazing discovery while investigating a Canadian mine.

The water source they discovered was between 1.5 billion and 2.64 billion years old, according to the study's tests. It was the oldest thing ever discovered on Earth, considering how isolated it was.

Interestingly, the tests also revealed that there was once life in the water.

Professor Sherwood Lollar said in an interview with BBC News that when people think about this water, they presume it must be a minute amount of water trapped within the rock.

"But in fact, it's very much bubbling right up out at you. These things are flowing at rates of litres per minute; the volume of the water is much larger than anyone anticipated."

Discussing the presence of life in the water, Sherwood Lollar added: "By looking at the sulphate in the water, we were able to see a fingerprint that's indicative of the presence of life." 

The professor continued: "And we were able to indicate that the signal we are seeing in the fluids has to have been produced by microbiology and, most importantly, has to have been produced over a very long time scale."

While hinting at the age of the water, she said: "The microbes that produced this signature couldn't have done it overnight. This has to be an indication that organisms have been present in these fluids on a geological timescale."

People can go to extraordinary lengths to satisfy their curiosity, especially scientists, and doing just that, the professor also revealed that she tried the water for herself.

"If you're a geologist who works with rocks, you've probably licked a lot of rocks," Sherwood Lollar told CNN. 

However, the real question is: how would it have tasted? Did it have a smell? Did it become slimy?

She revealed that the water was "very salty and bitter" and "much saltier than seawater." Does her revelation now tempt you to drink water that is more than a billion years old?