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Biotech Science

Ancient Antarctic Bacteria Revived 64

Posted by michael from the better-get-your-flu-shot dept.
Danny Rathjens writes "Frozen bacteria from Antarctica, estimated to be between five to eight million years old, were brought back to life simply by warming them up! NASA folks also participated since they think this can give them better clues on where to look for life on Mars."
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Ancient Antarctic Bacteria Revived More

Ancient Antarctic Bacteria Revived

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  • Before opening, please see (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Alrescha ( 50745 ) on Friday February 20, 2004 @12:37PM (#8340710)
    "The Andromeda Strain", by Michael Crichton, (c) 1969

    A.


    • Also, check the expiration date on the bottom of the can.

    • The human race is far too adaptive to be wiped out by viral or bacterial out break. Of course I can only talk out of my ass here, as I have no definitive proof exept for Europe surviving the Black Plauge; but every single disease that has surfaced (including AIDs >ptolemu writes "including AIDsA HREF=http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/1996pres/96092 6 .html) has revealed a community of people that were either resistant or immune. For example I carry the gene for sickle cell anemia and as a side effect I hav
      • Sorry...still learning how to post in HTML...let me try this again within my current skill level. The human race is far too adaptive to be wiped out by viral or bacterial out break. Of course I can only talk out of my ass here, as I have no definitive proof except for Europe surviving the Black Plague; but every single disease that has surfaced (including AIDs http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/1996pres/960926.htm l ) has revealed a community of people that were either resistant or immune. For example I carry
    • Now, in addition to all the other dangers of scientific research, you want to add the possibility of torture? You inhuman bastard! Oh well, at least you're not asking them to read any of Crichton's dreck. Movies are a medium where Crichton's levels of ignorance, stupidity and scientific illiteracy are the norm, which helps numb the pain somewhat.... :)

    • Feh (Score:3, Funny)

      by Valdrax ( 32670 )
      So you mean civilization will nearly be brought to the brink of extinction by an unknown plague only to have it mysteriously mutate completely and in unison to a rubber-eating form just in time for the total cop-out ending?

  • The geeky perspective... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jeeves99 ( 187755 ) * on Friday February 20, 2004 @12:44PM (#8340768)
    I have whole freezers full of mammalian, bacteria, and yeast cells that I can though out and revive with a usual 80% efficiency. Freezing cells for later use is VERY common in the research world. For longterm storage -160 is preferred and for short term -80 is acceptable. The fact that these survived bacteria so long at -27 is suprising. It makes me wonder what percentage actually survived.

    What is a bit more suprising about this is that the cells were not stored in any special solution. DMSO or glycerol based solutions are typically added to the cell media right before freezing because they prevent ice crystals from burtsting the cells. You ever fill a sealed glass container with water and then freeze it? The water will expand and crack the glass. Same principle here.

    These bacteria cells are hardy little suckers.
    • Ummm...didn't it say that these were soil bacteria from Antarctica? Wouldn't they have had umpteen jillion bacterial generations of adopting to being frozen frequently (without any high-tech chemical preservatives, ultra-cool or temp-controlled freezers, etc.) before things got a bit colder and turned 'em into Rip Van Winkle's?
      • "These bacteria cells are hardy little suckers."

        I think I answered your criticism with my closing statement. Obviously immortalized mammalian cells would not have survived such treatment. These bacteria cells did.
    • When you freeze mammalian cells, you do not have to use DMSO, 100% FBS will do. Besides, mammalian cells have not adopted to being frozen. Bacteria often do, especially soil ones. In addition, some organisms sporulate and spores are very resistant to harsh treatment. It is not surprising to me that bacteria sutvived that long, although it is definetely unusual.
      • True, DMSO (etc) doesn't have to be used, but the yields can be a lot better if you do. As long as you get the cells out of the DMSO soon after thawing, there usually aren't any negative effects. I usually plate 1mL thawed mammalian fibroblast cells w/ DMSO + 10mL BCS (or FCS) in a 10cm plate and then do a medium change the next day. Easy as pie. Protocols are different per cell lines of course.

        But yeah, extremophiles are really nifty cell types. Do you know if these bacteria have been classified as e
        • No, I do not know if they were classified at all. Logically thinking, they were not living at extreme temperature, right? They should not be classified as extremophiles. Longevity, - that's different story.
      • so is there possibility that there might be a hive of multi-billion year old bacterium out there?? Just waiting for some little kid with a rock hammer to set them free?

        Scary thought...

    • The alternative explanation, of course, is that the bacteria are only a few hundred/thousand years old, and the geologic dating is off. Then it wouldn't be surprising at all that they survived this long as frozen spores.

      I've always wondered why the geologic dating is given the priority of being accurate and the improbability of bacteria surviving that long is NOT taken as a check on the geologic dating.
    • I think these bacteria have evolved a mechanism to allow them to be frozen easily. Antarctica is the place where they have been found, it's not like it became a freezingly cold place that froze everything overnight some millions years ago. So these bacteria evolved to survive regular freezing and unfreezing.

      It would be more surprising to see a bacteria that is common in high temperature areas to do the same.
    • I have whole freezers full of mammalian, bacteria, and yeast cells that I can though out and revive with a usual 80% efficiency.Freezing cells for later use is VERY common in the research world.

      Yeah I have meat, yoghurt and bread dough in my freezer as well. Its very common in the "breakfast lunch and dinner" world as well.

  • Obviously... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Your_Mom ( 94238 ) <slashdot@@@innismir...net> on Friday February 20, 2004 @12:44PM (#8340773) Homepage
    ...these scientists haven't watched enough horror movies.

  • Sci-fi mumbojumbo (Score:4, Interesting)

    by mwheeler01 ( 625017 ) <matthew@l@wheeler.gmail@com> on Friday February 20, 2004 @12:45PM (#8340786)
    I love the comments so far that are foretelling doom. Perhaps these microbes will lead us in the direction of a cure for cancer or be ultra efficient energy producers that can live in batteries. Those seem just a likely to me.
    • The only comments preceding yours are jokes based on bad horror movies or stories. At the time you posted this, there were no comments "foretelling doom".

    • reasonable? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by BigChigger ( 551094 )
      Yeah, a chance at new batteries vs. possible plague. Sounds like a reasonable risk to me. At least as long as someone else does the dying.

      BC

  • No, I did not RTFA, but I hope these guys know what the hell they're doing, i.e. I hope to hell [er- heaven] that they're doing this in one of those negative pressure Category III facilities, and that they're all wearing those Intel bunny spacesuits.

    While I'll agree that it's a low probability event, if they were to revive some bacteria for which modern organisms lacked an immune response, there could be some serious hell to pay.

    I have the same feeling about this idiotic mission to return a mist sample

    • Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't the bacteria/microbe have to be properly suited for conditions inside the human body before it could do damage? It's not exactly a friendly place for most invaders, especially those that are not grown in our environment.

      Certainly, there's a chance with older Earth-bound microbes, but I wonder if 'space-faring' organisms would even survive (much less thrive) in our rather rare environment.
    • I remember reading a piece of fiction where the guy finds a preserved human carcass of one of the 1917 flu epidemic victims frozen in the permafrost in northern Alaska, and collects a sample. Having gone on a few digs and seeing how well preserved some tissue was from tens of thousands of years ago, well it made me think. We still turn up an occaisonal 36,000 y.o. Bison [beringia.com] or mastodon here.

      -cp-

      Alaska Bugs Sweat Gold Nuggets [alaska-freegold.com]

    • Y'know, if these other articles on rapid climate change are to be believed, and a huge chunk of the Antarctic ice shelf really did just break off into the ocean recently, soon there's going to be a lot of these multi-million-year-old bacteria waking up and wandering around in our ecosystem, completely uncontrolled, carried by ocean currents and airborne wind patterns...

      Antarctic ice and CO2 [slashdot.org]

  • 8 million years is nothing. (Score:5, Informative)

    by eggstasy ( 458692 ) on Friday February 20, 2004 @01:19PM (#8341216) Journal
    Around 1995 [sciencenews.org] scientists extracted bacteria from an insect's stomach, that had been trapped in amber for 125 million years, and they lived.
    A few years later, scientists revived bacteria that had been dormant inside a crystal of common table salt for 250 million years!
    Even so, Mars has been geologically dead for 1.5 billion years, so I don't know how how these paltry 8 million years are suddenly so significant.
    • I think at this scale radiation becomes limiting factor even on Earth, let alone Mars. Radiation creates defects in the DNA that are not fixed if the bacteria is frozen.

    • Re:8 million years is nothing. (Score:4, Informative)

      by Euphonious Coward ( 189818 ) on Friday February 20, 2004 @01:52PM (#8341600)
      The bacteria from bugs were, in fact, extracted from the crops of bees embedded in amber. The bacteria are of a type that is symbiotic with the bee.

      My wife's cousin Sid was on the team analyzing the heritage of these bacteria (actually, I think, their mitochondria). They were able to demonstrate that the strain extracted was ancestral to those found in various species of modern bees.

      Normally, when you publish stuff like this, everyone insists that the bacteria you have must have come from contamination on your equipment, and didn't really come out of the bee at all. To prove them wrong you have to show that the bacteria are quantifiably different from any modern strain.


    • "A few years later, scientists revived bacteria that had been dormant inside a crystal of common table salt for 250 million years!"


      Table Salt? Makes me wonder where they found the 250 million year old saltshaker?

  • Seeds might also be revivable (Score:5, Interesting)

    by justanyone ( 308934 ) on Friday February 20, 2004 @01:26PM (#8341288) Homepage Journal
    Sorry, this may be apocryphal, but here's two stories I remember reading:

    • A house in Britain that was moved / removed. Underneath the stone and misc. flooring (which was all removed) a bunch of flowers sprouted that were totally unlike any in the area, but which matched descriptions from the middle ages of flowers at the time. But these flowers are long gone from Britain now.
    • Likewise, I've heard that some wheat taken from an Egyptian tomb was planted and it sprouted (this was probably great for some genetic diversity study).

    What I'm wondering is, I wonder if any seeds (or at least pollen) can be found preserved by extreme cold in the Antartic that could grow to be real plants ? If so, it seems to me a study of the amino acids, etc. in the plants might be worthwhile of study.

    Does anyone know if plants have DNA? I am thinking that only animals have DNA, that plants have different structures like RNA or something. Sorry for my ignorance, I'm willing to read this online if someone can point me in the right direction to a site on the basics of plant biology without being too 'biochemical genetic engineering' (expert level) text. I've had HS bio, and college chem, and lots and lots and lots of physics, but that's it...

    Thanks,
    -- Kevin J. Rice

    • Re:Seeds might also be revivable (Score:5, Informative)

      by Noofus ( 114264 ) * on Friday February 20, 2004 @01:36PM (#8341385)
      Every living thing that we have discovered on thsi planet so far has DNA. Everything. "Modern" (Eukaryotic) multi-celled and many single eleed organisms keep their DNA in the cell nuclei. Most bacteria (but not all) are of the "non-modern" (Prokaryotic) type. Their DNA just floats around in their cells. However they ALL have DNA.

      Even viruses, which are debatable as to their status as organisms keep DNA around (though a few are RNA based and known as retro viruses. HIV is an example)

    • Re:Seeds might also be revivable (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Elledan ( 582730 ) on Friday February 20, 2004 @01:43PM (#8341491) Homepage
      "Does anyone know if plants have DNA? I am thinking that only animals have DNA, that plants have different structures like RNA or something. Sorry for my ignorance, I'm willing to read this online if someone can point me in the right direction to a site on the basics of plant biology without being too 'biochemical genetic engineering' (expert level) text. I've had HS bio, and college chem, and lots and lots and lots of physics, but that's it..."

      All biological organisms use DNA. While early life forms are likely to have used RNA exclusively, DNA is used because it's very stable (from a biochemical point of view). Only some viruses contain a string of RNA instead of DNA.

      You might find this site interesting. [ultranet.com]
    • Likewise, I've heard that some wheat taken from an Egyptian tomb was planted and it sprouted (this was probably great for some genetic diversity study). Nah, that seems to be an urban legend. It would be awfully cool, though! Kew Botanic Gardens [kew.org] talks abou it.

      A house in Britain that was moved / removed. Underneath the stone and misc. flooring (which was all removed) a bunch of flowers sprouted that were totally unlike any in the area, but which matched descriptions from the middle ages of flowers at the

      • "Even greater longevity has been reported in a seed of the Indian or Sacred Lotus Nelumbo nucifera from an ancient lake bed in China. This seed has been germinated and subsequently radio-carbon-dated by Shen-Miller and colleagues in California in the 1990s as being 1,288 +/- 271 years old."

        I recall reading something about this. The lotus seed was found in a dugout canoe in a peat bog. The estimate in the article I read, was the seed would have been ~1,200 years old.

        While treating poison oak I found the

    • Every living organism on earth, plants and bacteria included, maintain their genome primarily in DNA, and use RNA during the process of converting the DNA source code into protein executables (see what a CS/Bio double major does for you?). To note an exception, there are many viruses that carry their entire genome in RNA, but there is some debate as to whether or not viruses are even alive, as they're little more than *NA wrapped in a protein shell.

  • Current day implications... (Score:5, Funny)

    by rodney dill ( 631059 ) on Friday February 20, 2004 @02:02PM (#8341718) Journal
    ...We're not sure how long Al Gore can go yet and still be revived.
  • There have been scattered reports of glowing green swarms attacking people at night in the woods
  • Five to eight million years old? Oh Please! Any good christian will tell you that the Earth is only a few thousand years old.
  • H.P. Lovecraft foresaw this type of discovery in his novella _At the Mountains of Madness_ [dagonbytes.com]. Could this be evidence of the old ones??!
  • Well I, for one, welcome our new ancient bacterial overlords!

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