Scientists Pull Living Microbes, Possibly 100 Million Years Old, From Beneath the Sea (sciencemag.org) 20
sciencehabit writes: Microbes buried beneath the sea floor for more than 100 million years are still alive, a new study reveals. When brought back to the lab and fed, they started to multiply. The microbes are oxygen-loving species that somehow exist on what little of the gas diffuses from the ocean surface deep into the seabed. The discovery raises the "insane" possibility, as one of the scientists put it, that the microbes have been sitting in the sediment dormant, or at least slowly growing without dividing, for eons. The new work demonstrates "microbial life is very persistent, and often finds a way to survive," says Virginia Edgcomb, a microbial ecologist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution who was not involved in the work.
What's more, by showing that life can survive in places biologists once thought uninhabitable, the research speaks to the possibility of life elsewhere in the Solar System, or elsewhere in the universe. "If the surface of a particular planet does not look promising for life, it may be holding out in the subsurface," says Andreas Teske, a microbiologist at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, who was also not involved with the new study. Researchers have known that life exists "under the floorboards" of the ocean for more than 15 years. But geomicrobiologist Yuki Morono of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology wanted to know the limits of such life. Microbes are known to live in very hot or toxic environments, but can they live where there's little food to eat? To find out, Morono and his colleagues mounted a drilling expedition in the South Pacific Gyre, a site of intersecting ocean currents east of Australia that is considered the deadest part of the world's oceans, almost completely lacking the nutrients needed for survival. When they extracted cores of clay and other sediments from as deep as 5700 meters below sea level, they confirmed the samples did indeed contain some oxygen, a sign that there was very little organic material for bacteria to eat.
What's more, by showing that life can survive in places biologists once thought uninhabitable, the research speaks to the possibility of life elsewhere in the Solar System, or elsewhere in the universe. "If the surface of a particular planet does not look promising for life, it may be holding out in the subsurface," says Andreas Teske, a microbiologist at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, who was also not involved with the new study. Researchers have known that life exists "under the floorboards" of the ocean for more than 15 years. But geomicrobiologist Yuki Morono of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology wanted to know the limits of such life. Microbes are known to live in very hot or toxic environments, but can they live where there's little food to eat? To find out, Morono and his colleagues mounted a drilling expedition in the South Pacific Gyre, a site of intersecting ocean currents east of Australia that is considered the deadest part of the world's oceans, almost completely lacking the nutrients needed for survival. When they extracted cores of clay and other sediments from as deep as 5700 meters below sea level, they confirmed the samples did indeed contain some oxygen, a sign that there was very little organic material for bacteria to eat.
Really? (Score:2)
On the photo we see that the scientists fiddle with the cores with bare hands, not wearing gloves nor face-masks and put little non-disinfected flags into the core.
Could very well be that now the bacteria are only a day old.
Re: (Score:2)
I see no fiddle in video, what am I missing?
Fiddle can refer to the instrument but as a verb, it can mean something different like:
"to make minor manual movements especially to adjust something" or
"touch or fidget with something in a restless or nervous way."
Re: (Score:2)
This is how the end of the world starts!
Re: (Score:2)
Hahahaha, no. Allow for actual experts to have a minimal clue what they are doing.
Re: Really? (Score:2)
How do you know the little flags are not disinfected? It's cool how you assume that scientists don't know how to do their job based on a single photograph. This is an amazing discovery, and you're focused on one picture. How about reading the article and actually learning something?
FIne. (Score:2)
Just ignore three of Crichton's novels. It'll be fine.
Re: (Score:1)
And some of Lovecraft's.
"Huh, these Old Ones are really teeny."
Re: (Score:2)
Should we rely on science, or fictional madness?
thats great (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
but heaven forbid if someone has a bowl of bat soup
Dracula agrees wholeheartedly-- bat soup is BAD for you. And even worse if it's him.
I have seen this movie! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
I have seen 2020. Don't Try Any New Shit this year!
uhh.... (Score:2)
Old and exotic lifeforms I'll grant ya - That's intriguing.
100 million years old? Uh - no. That strains credulity. And, of course, you just KILLED them for your scientific research!
Re: (Score:2)
Most single cell organisms, as bacteria, live forever. They only die by getting eaten or other environmental hazard or mutation (chemicals/radiation) into a form that can not survive.
In other words: they have no "natural aging mechanism" build in.
Re: (Score:2)
We don't have enough problems with microbes? (Score:3)
I'm all for scientific advancement, but let's get the current one under control before we go digging up more.
The Reality TV Potential Here Is Endless (Score:1)