New Extremeophiles

Nematodes, multicellular worms, eat bacteria in a mile deep mine. It was thought only bacteria lived in such conditions:-
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/06/02/worms-from-hell-found-in-a-place-nobody-thought-they-could-live/#more-40951

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An extreme example of extremophile bacteria, and possible industrial use!-http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110705123346.htm

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Under 800 meters of ice in a lake:-http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=life-discovered-under-ice-in-antarctic-lake&WT.mc_id=SA_CAT_SPCPHYS_20130214

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Really old, but newly found. An archaeon that eats perchlorate. From the human standpoint try a cocktail of chlorox!-http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2013/04/04/new-extremophile-breathes-rocket-fuel/?WT_mc_id=SA_DD_20130405

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How to live for centuries in ice:-http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2013/10/10/colder-than-ice-researchers-discover-how-microbes-survive-in-sub-freezing-conditions/?WT_mc_id=SA_DD_20131010

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Life on Earth can be found almost everywhere. Possible traces using isotopes of carbon turn up clues of methane probably produced by life:- http://www.livescience.com/48447-deepest-life-methane-clues.html?cmpid=558414

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Beneath the ocean floor:-"Like the microbes on the forest floor that break down leaf litter and dead organisms, the microbes in the ocean also break down organicthat is, carbon-basedmaterial like dead fish and algae. Unlike their counterparts, however, the microbes beneath the ocean crust often lack the oxygen that is used on land to effect the necessary chemical reaction.-"Instead, these microbes can use sulfate to break down carbon from decaying biological material that sinks to the sea bottom and makes its way into the crustal aquifer, producing carbon dioxide.-"Learning how these new microbes function will be important to getting a more accurate, quantified understanding of the overall global carbon cyclea natural cycling of carbon through the environment in which it is consumed by plants, exhaled by animals and enters the ocean via the atmosphere."- Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-01-exotic-microbe-undersea-aquifer.html#jCp

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As the Mariana trench is explored further active life ecosystems reveal many new species:

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/12/21/unexplored-ocean-depths-bustling-with-life-despi...

"APRA HARBOR, GUAM – A team of leading geologists, chemists, and biologists aboard research vessel Falkor have just finished surveying the largely unexplored Mariana Back-Arc for life at depths greater than 13,000 feet. Dr. David Butterfield, JISAO, University of Washington, and Dr. William Chadwick, NOAA-PMEL and Oregon State University, led the group to the Back-Arc; returning for the second phase of a two-part exploration of the region. In 2015, the team of scientists located new hydrothermal vents in the Back-Arc region, including evidence of recent lava flows.

This year, the team returned to these vent systems with the new remotely operated vehicle (ROV), SuBastian, to characterize their water chemistry and biodiversity. The new results fill a gap in knowledge about the biogeography of these unique deep-sea ecosystems and has implications for how tectonic setting influences the composition of chemosynthetic animal communities worldwide. The new vent sites have spectacular chimneys made of sulfide minerals, some up to 30 meters (100 feet) tall. The chimneys were belching smoky vent fluid at temperatures up to 365°C (690°F) and were covered with vent animals including “hairy snails”, shrimp, crabs, mussels, limpets, squat lobsters, anemones, and polychaete worms.

"Scientists on board Falkor suspect that some new species have been discovered at the new sites, but confirmation will have to await further study back on shore. The new observations show that the newly discovered vent sites have an ecosystem that is characteristic of the Mariana Back-Arc, with some animal species found nowhere else on Earth. This, despite the fact that each vent site is relatively small and isolated, being separated from the others by up to 100 miles.

"The new observations suggest that the Back-Arc vent sites are relatively long-lived and that each site has biological “connectivity” with the others despite the long distances. The study also confirmed that the Back-Arc ecosystems are distinct and different from the nearby Volcanic Arc hydrothermal ecosystems, supporting the idea that geological and chemical environment play a key role in selecting animal community composition at hydrothermal vents. This is the first series of scientific dives for ROV SuBastian.

"Equipped with numerous cameras, including a high-definition 4K video camera, the dives were live streamed onto YouTube and watched by millions. The multidisciplinary team will continue to analyze the data and samples collected during this expedition to advance research on how life thrives on these extreme deep-sea hydrothermal vents. This research was supported by the NOAA Ocean Exploration and Research Program, the NOAA Pacific Islands Regional Office, and the Schmidt Ocean Institute."

Comment: Look at the site to see the picture of some of the animals seen at 13,000 feet deep. These vents may be the source of original life.

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Actually true and they produce enzymes to help the process. They are nort fully understood, but studies are commencing:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20160621-electron-eating-microbes-found-in-odd-places/?u...

"The electricity-eating microbes that the researchers were hunting for belong to a larger class of organisms that scientists are only beginning to understand. They inhabit largely uncharted worlds: the bubbling cauldrons of deep sea vents; mineral-rich veins deep beneath the planet’s surface; ocean sediments just a few inches below the deep seafloor. The microbes represent a segment of life that has been largely ignored, in part because their strange habitats make them incredibly difficult to grow in the lab.

"Yet early surveys suggest a potential microbial bounty. A recent sampling of microbes collected from the seafloor near Catalina Island, off the coast of Southern California, uncovered a surprising variety of microbes that consume or shed electrons by eating or breathing minerals or metals. El-Naggar’s team is still analyzing their gold mine data, but he says that their initial results echo the Catalina findings. Thus far, whenever scientists search for these electron eaters in the right locations — places that have lots of minerals but not a lot of oxygen — they find them.

***

"Though eating electricity seems bizarre, the flow of current is central to life. All organisms require a source of electrons to make and store energy. They must also be able to shed electrons once their job is done. In describing this bare-bones view of life, Nobel Prize-winning physiologist Albert Szent-Györgyi once said, “Life is nothing but an electron looking for a place to rest.”

"Humans and many other organisms get electrons from food and expel them with our breath. The microbes that El-Naggar and others are trying to grow belong to a group called lithoautotrophs, or rock eaters, which harvest energy from inorganic substances such as iron, sulfur or manganese. Under the right conditions, they can survive solely on electricity.

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"The microbe Spormann studied, Methanococcus maripaludis, excretes an enzyme that sits on the electrode’s surface. The enzyme pairs an electron from the electrode with a proton from water to create a hydrogen atom, which is a well-established food source among methanogens. “Rather than having a conductive pathway, they use an enzyme,” said Daniel Bond, a microbiologist at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. “They don’t need to build a bridge out of conductive materials.”

"Though the microbes aren’t eating naked electrons, the results are surprising in their own right. Most enzymes work best inside the cell and rapidly degrade outside. “What’s unique is how stable the enzymes are when they [gather on] the surface of the electrode,” Spormann said. Past experiments suggest these enzymes are active outside the cell for only a few hours, “but we showed they are active for six weeks.”

***

"Given the bounty from these early experiments, it seems that scientists have only scratched the surface of the microbial diversity that thrives beneath the planet’s shallow exterior. The results could give clues to the origins of life on Earth and beyond. One theory for the emergence of life suggests it originated on mineral surfaces, which could have concentrated biological molecules and catalyzed reactions. New research could fill in one of the theory’s gaps — a mechanism for transporting electrons from mineral surfaces into cells.

"Moreover, subsurface metal eaters may provide a blueprint for life on other worlds, where alien microbes might be hidden beneath the planet’s shallow exterior. “For me, one of the most exciting possibilities is finding life-forms that might survive in extreme environments like Mars,” said El-Naggar, whose gold mine experiment is funded by NASA’s Astrobiology Institute. Mars, for example, is iron-rich and has water flowing beneath its surface. “If you have a system that can pick up electrons from iron and have some water, then you have all the ingredients for a conceivable metabolism,” said El-Naggar. Perhaps a former mine a mile underneath South Dakota won’t be the most surprising place that researchers find electron-eating life."

Comment: Since this form of life is so poorly understood so far, it is hard to predict how these organisms might relate to the origin of life, but they certainly could open up a whole new approach of study. Hopefully they can be grown in larger numbers in labs and studies much more closely.

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DAVID: Actually true and they produce enzymes to help the process. They are not fully understood, but studies are commencing:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/20160621-electron-eating-microbes-found-in-odd-places/?u...

QUOTE: "Though eating electricity seems bizarre, the flow of current is central to life. All organisms require a source of electrons to make and store energy. They must also be able to shed electrons once their job is done. In describing this bare-bones view of life, Nobel Prize-winning physiologist Albert Szent-Györgyi once said, “Life is nothing but an electron looking for a place to rest.”
"Humans and many other organisms get electrons from food and expel them with our breath."

David’s comment: Since this form of life is so poorly understood so far, it is hard to predict how these organisms might relate to the origin of life, but they certainly could open up a whole new approach of study. Hopefully they can be grown in larger numbers in labs and studies much more closely.

Once again, thank you for another fascinating insight into how these more primitive forms of life actually function. The only thing I would add to your comment – a point which relates to the theistic side of my thinking – is the fact that even if these microorganisms do help us to understand the beginnings of life, they do not help us to understand evolution, i.e. the process by which they could ultimately turn into whales, butterflies, weaverbirds and humans.

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David’s comment: Since this form of life is so poorly understood so far, it is hard to predict how these organisms might relate to the origin of life, but they certainly could open up a whole new approach of study. Hopefully they can be grown in larger numbers in labs and studied much more closely.

dhw: Once again, thank you for another fascinating insight into how these more primitive forms of life actually function. The only thing I would add to your comment – a point which relates to the theistic side of my thinking – is the fact that even if these microorganisms do help us to understand the beginnings of life, they do not help us to understand evolution, i.e. the process by which they could ultimately turn into whales, butterflies, weaverbirds and humans.

Thank you. No, they don't help explain evolution, but they do point out that any of the earliest life forms had to have a consistent energy source and the ability to use it. It is possible that these electron chewers are not one of the earliest forms of life, but a side branch developed well after early life began.

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Each one has great evolutionary tricks to survive:

https://cosmosmagazine.com/biology/four-organisms-living-in-extreme-conditions

"Heated by a subterranean supervolcano, the bubbling hot springs of Yellowstone can exceed 90°C, too hot for ordinary organisms.

"In 1969, while studying the extremophile microbes that do live in Yellowstone’s hotsprings – and give them their colour – Thomas D. Brock and Hudson Freeze of Indiana University discovered Thermus aquaticus. This microbe went on to underpin almost every genetics discovery ever made.

"T. aquaticus contains a heat-tolerant DNA-polymerising enzyme that, once isolated, became a cornerstone of the polymerase chain reaction. PCR is how tiny DNA samples are amplified for analysis – crucial for everything from crime scene analysis to genome reading."

Comment: a special enzyme protects. Enzymes are giant molecules. How did evolution find it by chance?

"When winter arrives in Alaska, the local wood frogs freeze solid. Some seven months later, when spring finally arrives, the thawed-out frogs hop away.

"Freezing once would kill almost any other vertebrate, their organs pierced by ice crystals. Yet as autumn sets in, Alaska’s wood frogs can survive two weeks of night/day freeze-thaw cycles before finally freezing solid. The frogs, like certain other freeze-tolerant fish and insects, produce chemicals that stop ice crystals forming."

Comment: They are known to make an antifreeze molecule.

"Deinococcus radioduransis can survive blasts of gamma radiation 3,000 times the lethal dose for humans.

"In 1999, the US Department of Energy funded research to sequence the bacterium’s genome, in the hope of developing waste-consuming microbes to clean extremely contaminated nuclear sites.

"Surprisingly, D. radioduransis’s DNA has proved just as susceptible to radiation damage as a regular E.coli. The bacterium’s secret is a set of antioxidants that protect its proteins from radiation damage. These proteins can then rapidly repair damaged DNA."

Comment: At the time of early life, radiation on Earth was much more severe than now. That property must come from that ancient time when life originated.

"The microscopic tardigrade, or water bear, can survive heat, cold, desiccation, lack of oxygen and radiation. The tiny animal has even been shown to survive a 10-day trip into space, prompting some to suggest it’s the kind of creature that could live on Mars.
Not so. To survive these conditions the tardigrade puts itself into a form of non-reproductive suspended animation.

"Some extremophiles, however, really do seem equipped for life on the Red Planet. Subterranean micro-organisms found in Earth’s deepest mines and caves seem to have what it takes to survive below the surface on Mars (Cosmos 61, p70). Studying Earth’s extremophiles offers a possible glimpse of what alien life may look like – and where to look for it."

Comment: These examples show how tough life is. We do not know how these living inventions appear, but all the mechanisms are helpful in research.

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QUOTE: "Some extremophiles, however, really do seem equipped for life on the Red Planet. Subterranean micro-organisms found in Earth’s deepest mines and caves seem to have what it takes to survive below the surface on Mars (Cosmos 61, p70). Studying Earth’s extremophiles offers a possible glimpse of what alien life may look like – and where to look for it."

David’s comment: These examples show how tough life is. We do not know how these living inventions appear, but all the mechanisms are helpful in research.

Thank you for all these truly wonderful wonders. The last one raises huge questions which might perhaps be best left unasked until we discover life elsewhere, if we ever do. I would just like to emphasize that the great mystery is not solely how life began, but also how it could have evolved as it has done on Earth. And that of course is the mystery we have been grappling with all these years. You are doing us all a great service, David, by informing us about these wonders.

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dhw: Thank you for all these truly wonderful wonders. The last one raises huge questions which might perhaps be best left unasked until we discover life elsewhere, if we ever do. I would just like to emphasize that the great mystery is not solely how life began, but also how it could have evolved as it has done on Earth. And that of course is the mystery we have been grappling with all these years. You are doing us all a great service, David, by informing us about these wonders.

You are welcome. Note my entry today on oxygen and early life and evolution. These guys give a clue about early life without oxygen.

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New studies on one form suggest ways they may have evolved to less extreme environments. Most extremophiles are archaea and relate to original life:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/01/180126085437.htm

"Extremophiles -- hardy organisms living in places that would kill most life on Earth -- provide fascinating insights into evolution, metabolism and even possible extraterrestrial life. A new study provides insights into how one type of extremophile, a heat-loving microbe that uses ammonia for energy production, may have been able to make the transition from hot springs to more moderate environments across the globe. The first-ever analysis of DNA of a contemporary heat-loving, ammonia-oxidizing organism, published in open-access journal Frontiers in Microbiology, reveals that evolution of the necessary adaptations may have been helped by highly mobile genetic elements and DNA exchange with a variety of other organisms.

***

"Only one branch, Thaumarchaeota, has managed to colonize very successfully the Earth's more hospitable places -- but scientists don't know why.

"Thaumarchaeota are found in very large numbers in virtually all environments, including the oceans, soils, plant leaves and the human skin," says Professor Christa Schleper from the University of Vienna, Austria, who guided and initiated the study. "We want to know what their secret is: billions of years ago, how did they adapt from hot springs, where it seems all archaea evolved, to more moderate habitats?"

"As a starting point to answer this question, Professor Schleper and her team isolated a Thaumarchaeota species from a hot spring in Italy then sequenced and analyzed its genome. This represents the first genome analysis of the Nitroscaldus lineage -- a subgroup of heat-loving Thaumarchaeota that get their energy by oxidizing ammonia into nitrite.

"The analysis revealed that the organism, Candidatus Nitrosocaldus cavascurensis, seems to represent the closest-related lineage to the last common ancestor of all Thaumarchaeota. Intriguingly, it has highly mobile DNA elements and seems to have frequently exchanged DNA with other organisms -- including other archaea, viruses and possibly even bacteria.

"The ability to exchange genetic material could help this archaeon to rapidly evolve. "This organism seems prone to lateral gene transfer and invasion by foreign DNA elements," says Professor Schleper. "Such mechanisms may have also helped the ancestral lines of Thaumarchaeota to evolve and eventually radiate into moderate environments -- and N. cavascurensis may still be evolving through genetic exchange with neighboring organisms in its hot spring."

"Many researchers assume that the first life forms on Earth evolved in hot springs. Further studies of this thermophile archaeon might help identify general mechanisms that enabled the first living cells, both bacteria and archaea, to conquer the world."

Comment: Hot springs and hot vents in oceans certainly are appealing as points of origin of life, and the possibility horizontal gene transfer plays a major role in evolution at this stage, as suggested by this study, is intriguing. See this:

https://cosmosmagazine.com/biology/did-extremophiles-move-into-less-nasty-habitats-by-h...

"The team found that N. cavascurensis is most closely related to the last common ancestor of all Thaumarchaeota, a position in the lineage that can provide crucial information into the evolution of early life. Importantly, N. cavascurensis displays various features that are not typical of thermophilic archaea, including the integrated DNA of an ancient virus (known as a provirus), indicating an evolutionary move toward more moderate environments.

"N. cavascurensis’ genome also contains numerous mobile genetic elements that are implicated in “lateral gene transfer”, which is the movement of genetic material between existing organisms, rather than from parent to offspring, and this provides a clue to how they spread beyond extreme environments.

“'This organism seems prone to lateral gene transfer and invasion by foreign DNA elements,” says Schleper. “Such mechanisms may have also helped the ancestral lines of Thaumarchaeota to evolve and eventually radiate into moderate environments – and N. cavascurensis may still be evolving through genetic exchange with neighbouring organisms in its hot spring.'”

Comment: How much of the evolution of early life was by chance Darwinian mutation? Horizontal gene transfer could be God manipulating the mechanism.

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Survive despite dryness, toxic chemicals for eons:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/exotic-creature-in-antarctica-has-survived-m...

"In the decades after Wise's discovery, scientists tried to piece together a rough history of the landscape where Tullbergia was found. Seafloor sediments revealed that Antarctica had experienced 38 ice ages in the past five million years. During those freezes its glaciers thickened, rising inland and cloaking many of the mountain slopes that are exposed today. Temperatures were 5 degrees C to 10 degrees C colder than at present. Most researchers assumed the rising ice sheets “more or less wiped everything out,” says Steven Chown, a polar ecologist at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.

***

"But the results for Tullbergia and Antarctophorus suggested that even in warm times, the movement of these animals was more restricted than people thought. Two populations of Antarctophorus collected from exposed ridges on opposite sides of Shackleton Glacier appeared not to have interbred for five million years—despite the fact that they lived just 10 kilometers apart, the width of the gap that the glacier flows through. “It's quite surprising,” Hogg says. “Five million years is a long time.” It appeared that the species had not traveled at all.

***

"The analysis of Tullbergia collected around Shackleton Glacier stunned the researchers even more: the gene sequences from all four sites were virtually identical. “It's like they're all clones,” Adams says. That could mean that all the animals are descended from a couple of individuals and that these descendants have never bred with any outside populations. “That is something that we're all trying to wrestle [with] to explain,” Adams says.

"How could Tullbergia have persisted for millions of years, pinned down by ice during at least 30 ice ages, without moving more than a few kilometers or breeding with other populations? This question is all the more puzzling because for much of that time, these animals were trapped in a narrow zone between deadly ice and deadly salt.

***

"Turn over a rock above the trimline at Shackleton or any other Transantarctic mountain, and the soil underneath is often crusted in white salts. “It's not a good salt. It's not Himalayan rock salt,” Adams quips. “Put your tongue on this stuff, and it will light you up.”

"The salt is high in nitrate, toxic to many living things. Nitrate constantly rains down on Earth as ultraviolet radiation reacts with atmospheric gases. In most parts of the world, it does not accumulate in soils, because rain washes it away. But in dry places, like the Transantarctic Mountains, it can build up over millennia, until it reaches toxic levels.

"These high places also accumulate perchlorate, an oxidizing chemical used in disinfectants and rocket propellants—and famous, as discovered by the Phoenix Mars Lander, for making the surface of that planet an unpleasant place.

"The salts create a catch-22 for small animals such as springtails trying to escape advancing glaciers: remaining in place means they will become buried underneath ice, but creeping uphill leads to places that are “just nasty, toxic,” Adams says. “Really crappy habitat.”

***

"But with each new ice age, most of the populations died off. Tullbergia bears the scars of that brutal history in its DNA. The fact that every individual from around Shackleton Glacier carries virtually identical gene sequences suggests that at some point in the past, as few as two of the animals managed to survive. Every representative alive today is descended from those progenitors, which may have been lucky enough to be blown by a windstorm onto a patch of Goldilocks ground the size of a basketball court. Tullbergia “came extremely close to extinction,” Adams says."

Comment: It shows us how tough life on Earth can be. My thought is God purposely made it that way to be sure life persisted after its origin .

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New discoveries from Antarctic lakes:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/john-priscu-finds-life-in-antarcticas-frozen-lakes-20200...

"But this is why I’ve done these winters: We’re figuring out how these ecosystems function with so little energy input and wanted to get a year-round look. One thing that’s keeping them alive is relic organic matter deposited from the ocean in an earlier geologic era. Metabolisms are so low that these organisms can survive by consuming this ancient food matter.

***

"The U.S. got a piece of the accretion ice from 11,800 feet below the surface, which was still 490 feet above the lake. I didn’t have much ice to work with. The sample I got was roughly 20 inches long and about 3.5 inches in diameter, but that piece of ice changed my life. We took it to the lab and examined it under the cleanest conditions, using a scanning electron microscope to look at cells and minerals, and an atomic force microscope to examine cells at the atomic level. And bingo, we started seeing microbes. Extrapolating from the accretion ice, we estimated bacterial concentrations on the lake’s surface of about 100,000 cells per milliliter — about one-tenth that found in the ocean or the average non-frozen lake.

***

"All the numbers we had extrapolated from the Vostok accretion ice — about 100,000 cells per millimeter — were confirmed in Lake Whillans. And this time we had solid proof — measurements from an actual lake sample, without having to rely on extrapolations. These are the moments you live for.

"There’s no sunlight beneath half a mile of ice, so of course there’s no photosynthesis. Instead, we’ve identified a number of microbes called chemolithoautotrophs, which basically eat minerals for a living. They get their energy from the oxidation of inorganic compounds, and they get carbon from carbon dioxide. We also discovered that methane was diffusing upward from the sediments, fueling bacteria that oxidize methane for energy.

***

"We know that water can be trapped under glaciers in lakes or streams for a long time, but it eventually goes into the ocean. Lake Whillans drains every 10 years or so, and our geophysics teams have given us a pretty clear picture of the channels from Whillans and other lakes that flow into the Southern Ocean. It’s kind of like the Mississippi Delta with 3,000 feet of ice on it. We sampled roughly 6 miles out from where the Whillans’ flow meets the sea beneath the Ross Ice Shelf. And we found that enough nutrients [including carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus and iron] are being discharged from the lake to support a microbial ecosystem in the ocean waters below the ice. No one imagined that was possible.

***

"We drilled into Lake Mercer last year, going through about 3,500 feet of ice, and we found life there, too. But it’s different from what we see in Whillans, and the chemistry and dissolved oxygen levels are different. Cell density in Mercer is approximately 10 times lower. It’s not as productive as Whillans, which is three times saltier. Mercer gets a third of its water from East Antarctica, whereas Whillans gets most of its water from West Antarctica."

Comment: I assume the life found got there when the Antarctica was warm, and adapted as the climate changed. All living material is made to be tough. And to survive makes no mistakes as seen in complex multicellular forms.

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Described by Russian researchers:

https://cosmosmagazine.com/nature/marine-life/the-smaller-side-of-arctic-life/?utm_sour...

"Two Russian scientists have set out to document what they say are among the most undervalued creatures in the Arctic.

"Shell-bearing microgastropods (snails no larger than five millimetres) have a variety of diets and lifestyles and perform many functions in marine ecosystems, says ecologist Ivan Nekhaev, from St Petersburg State University.

"There are 66 known species in four sub-classes, Nekhaev says, but half of them have only had the external appearance of the shell studied. Important details of the internal structure and sequence of genes, traditionally used in the classification of animals, remain unknown.

"Part of that is no doubt because studying these animals is not easy.

“'Imagine a two-millimetre mollusc in front of you. From it, you need to extract its reproductive system, which is… tenths of a millimetre,” Nekhaev says. “This is a very delicate, laborious and meticulous work.”

"He and colleague Ekaterina Krol appear up for the task, however. They’ve summarised and analysed known information on the species composition and lifestyle of these animals in the eastern sector of the Arctic and described two species, with two others being worked on.

***

“'Despite the formal resemblance, the physiology and requirements for living conditions of these animals can vary significantly. The shape of the shell of some species is typical of the more southern areas.

“When they are found, it is often written that this is due to climate change. Such publications raise information noise, which makes it difficult to capture real changes in ecosystems.”

"To date 51 of the 66 species have been found in the Barents Sea, between Russia and Norway, but as few as 10-20 in other seas of the eastern Arctic and nine in the deep-water Arctic basin.

"However, an analysis of the similarity of species composition in different regions has also revealed a connection between the distribution of species complexes and hydrological conditions."

Comment: It seems as if extremeophiles can be larger than microscopic. Again we see life thriving everywhere on Earth.

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David’s comments:
I assume the life found got there when the Antarctica was warm, and adapted as the climate changed. All living material is made to be tough. And to survive makes no mistakes as seen in complex multicellular forms.

It seems as if extremeophiles can be larger than microscopic. Again we see life thriving everywhere on Earth.

Yes indeed, and it is the astonishing variety and adaptability of these organisms that makes me all the more inclined to accept the theory that they are possessed of an autonomous mechanism which enables them to thrive in all conditions. This is not an attack on the concept of a Creator God – on the contrary, in my view such a mechanism provides the most convincing evidence of a designer. But the greater the variety (both within species and in speciation itself), the less likely I find it that every one was preprogrammed 3.8 billion years ago, or that a designer kept stepping in to make all the necessary adjustments to enable each organism to survive each change in its living conditions.

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David’s comments:
I assume the life found got there when the Antarctica was warm, and adapted as the climate changed. All living material is made to be tough. And to survive makes no mistakes as seen in complex multicellular forms.

It seems as if extremeophiles can be larger than microscopic. Again we see life thriving everywhere on Earth.

dhw: Yes indeed, and it is the astonishing variety and adaptability of these organisms that makes me all the more inclined to accept the theory that they are possessed of an autonomous mechanism which enables them to thrive in all conditions. This is not an attack on the concept of a Creator God – on the contrary, in my view such a mechanism provides the most convincing evidence of a designer. But the greater the variety (both within species and in speciation itself), the less likely I find it that every one was preprogrammed 3.8 billion years ago, or that a designer kept stepping in to make all the necessary adjustments to enable each organism to survive each change in its living conditions.

I can't disagree that a powerful epigenetic mechanism following some instructive guidelines may exist, but is yet to be found. Like yesterdays double DNA discovery.

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New research:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/electron-eating-microbes-found-in-odd-places-20160621/?u...

"early surveys suggest a potential microbial bounty. A recent sampling of microbes collected from the seafloor near Catalina Island, off the coast of Southern California, uncovered a surprising variety of microbes that consume or shed electrons by eating or breathing minerals or metals.

***

"The microbes’ apparent ability to ingest electrons — known as direct electron transfer — is particularly intriguing because it seems to defy the basic rules of biophysics. The fatty membranes that enclose cells act as an insulator, creating an electrically neutral zone once thought impossible for an electron to cross. “No one wanted to believe that a bacterium would take an electron from inside of the cell and move it to the outside,”

***

"In the 1980s, Nealson and others discovered a surprising group of bacteria that can expel electrons directly onto solid minerals. It took until 2006 to discover the molecular mechanism behind this feat: A trio of specialized proteins sits in the cell membrane, forming a conductive bridge that transfers electrons to the outside of cell. (Scientists still debate whether the electrons traverse the entire distance of the membrane unescorted.)

"Inspired by the electron-donators, scientists began to wonder whether microbes could also do the reverse and directly ingest electrons as a source of energy. Researchers focused their search on a group of microbes called methanogens, which are known for making methane. Most methanogens aren’t strict metal eaters. But in 2009, Bruce Logan, an environmental engineer at Pennsylvania State University, and collaborators showed for the first time that a methanogen could survive using only energy from an electrode. The researchers proposed that the microbes were directly sucking up electrons, perhaps via a molecular bridge similar to the ones the electron-producers use to shuttle electrons across the cell wall

***

"Spormann and others still believe that methanogens and other microbes can directly suck up electricity, however. “This is an alternative mechanism to direct electron transfer, it doesn’t mean direct electron transfer can’t exist,” .... Spormann said his team has already found a microbe capable of taking in naked electrons. But they haven’t yet published the details.

***

"The different varieties of bacteria that Rowe collected thrive under different electrical conditions, suggesting they employ different strategies for eating electrons. “Each bacteria had a different energy level where electron uptake would happen,” Rowe said. “We think that is indicative of different pathways.”

***

Comment: These are amazing organisms which may well offer new approaches to origin of life research. Various forms of electrical charges, like the potassium ions, play major role in living organisms.

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3312 views

They do it through 'nanowires' made of extended cell membrane proteins:

https://phys.org/news/2018-03-electron-carrying-proteins-secret-electric-bacteria.html

"Scientist Moh El-Naggar and his team think it's possible. They work with the Shewanella oneidensis species of bacteria, one of a group of microbes that essentially "breathe" rocks.

"As part of their metabolism, the bacteria have developed a way to transfer electrons from the interior of the cell across their outer membrane to a receiving surface in the outside world.

"The process is akin to the way humans use oxygen to breathe. The body takes electrons from food and, ultimately, transfers those electrons to oxygen.

***

"'Microbes are highly evolved machines," El-Naggar said. "And what we have here is a class that is really good at converting energy and interacting with the abiotic world."

"Another advantage to using "electric bacteria" is already being explored at USC—wastewater treatment. Microbes feed on the waste, oxidizing the organic substances and producing a small amount of electricity.

***

"Depositing electrons outside the cell is how they survive, said El-Naggar, who holds the Robert D. Beyer ('81) Early Career Chair in Natural Sciences. "If one were to shut down the ability to transfer the electron out of their system, they would not be able to make energy. The bacteria would basically suffocate."

"Under the microscope, scientists can see what appear to be filaments projecting from these cells. For years, the prevailing hypothesis was that these were a form of tiny hairs called pili, similar to those found on other types of bacteria.

"But in 2013, a research scientist in El-Naggar's laboratory, Sahand Pirbadian, discovered that these projections, referred to as "nanowires," were actually extensions of the cell membrane covered in cytochromes—proteins containing iron that facilitate electron transport.

"These nanowires allow the bacteria to connect with surfaces much further away than one would expect.

"Through light microscopy imaging, the team had an idea of the nanowires' basic composition. But they were curious as to whether the cytochromes were close enough together to transport electrons along the wire. If the density were high enough, they thought a bridge could form along the membrane that would allow an electron to cross onto external surfaces.

***

"Subramanian and Pirbadian were able to capture life-like images of the bacteria and their nanowires. What they found was intriguing.

"'These are not simple tubes," El-Naggar said. "They turned out to be more like a chain of membrane pearls, strung together."

"With the images produced by ECT, the team was the first to see how electron transport proteins were distributed in the membrane to form the nanowires. While some were touching each other, many were further apart—up to 30 nanometers—a range too far for an electron to jump.

"With this new information, the team proposed that the proteins float within the membrane. This creates just enough collisions to allow electrons to exchange from one to the next until they reach the end of the nanowire and transfer to the rock or metal surface."

Comment: Life undoubtedly stated with bacteria-like organisms, which were given designed genetic instructions to make life tenacious and to survive any challenges. The proof of that tenacity is they are still here as the largest, most diverse biomass on Earth. I believe God started life, and meant that it would always survive. What has evolved beyond bacteria is undoubtedly not as tough, although representing a different kind of complexity.

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3092 views

New research in deep Antarctica lakes under almost a mile of ice:

https://www.livescience.com/64501-buried-lake-antarctica-life.html?utm_source=ls-newsle...

"The dark waters of a lake deep beneath the West Antarctic ice sheet and a few hundred miles from the South Pole are teeming with bacterial life, say scientists — despite it being one of the most extreme environments on Earth.

"Expedition leader John Priscu, a professor of polar ecology at the University of Montana, told Live Science in a telephone interview from Antarctica this week that early studies of water samples taken from Lake Mercer — which is buried beneath a glacier — showed that they contained approximately 10,000 bacterial cells per milliliter.

***

"The abundance of bacterial life in Lake Mercer complements the discovery of high levels of bacterial life in Antarctica's nearby subglacial Lake Whillans in 2013 — an expedition that was also led by Priscu.

"Scientists theorize that the bacteria in Lake Whillans — and possibly Lake Mercer — are surviving on deposits of carbon laid down by photosynthesizing organisms between 5000 and 10,000 years ago, when the buried lakes may have been connected to the open ocean.

***

"Priscu said that the drill team bored through about 3,504 feet (1,068 meters) of ice, and the water below was a chilly 30.8 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 0.65 degrees Celsius), so that scientific researchers could take water samples and sediment cores from the lake, which was about 49 feet (15 m) deep at that spot."

Comment: Extremophiles can handle anything.

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2763 views

Arsenic was used b y early bacteria in evolution:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/05/190502113603.htm

"Arsenic is a deadly poison for most living things, but new research shows that microorganisms are breathing arsenic in a large area of the Pacific Ocean. A University of Washington team has discovered that an ancient survival strategy is still being used in low-oxygen parts of the marine environment.

***

"'We've known for a long time that there are very low levels of arsenic in the ocean," said co-author Gabrielle Rocap, a UW professor of oceanography. "But the idea that organisms could be using arsenic to make a living -- it's a whole new metabolism for the open ocean."
The researchers analyzed seawater samples from a region below the surface where oxygen is almost absent, forcing life to seek other strategies. These regions may expand under climate change.

"'In some parts of the ocean there's a sandwich of water where there's no measureable oxygen," Rocap said. "The microbes in these regions have to use other elements that act as an electron acceptor to extract energy from food."

"The most common alternatives to oxygen are nitrogen or sulfur. But Saunders' early investigations suggested arsenic could also work, spurring her to look for the evidence.

"The team analyzed samples collected during a 2012 research cruise to the tropical Pacific, off the coast of Mexico. Genetic analyses on DNA extracted from the seawater found two genetic pathways known to convert arsenic-based molecules as a way to gain energy. The genetic material was targeting two different forms of arsenic, and authors believe that the pathways occur in two organisms that cycle arsenic back and forth between different forms.

"Results suggest that arsenic-breathing microbes make up less than 1% of the microbe population in these waters. The microbes discovered in the water are probably distantly related to the arsenic-breathing microbes found in hot springs or contaminated sites on land.

***

"Biologists believe the strategy is a holdover from Earth's early history. During the period when life arose on Earth, oxygen was scarce in both the air and in the ocean. Oxygen became abundant in Earth's atmosphere only after photosynthesis became widespread and converted carbon dioxide gas into oxygen.

"Early lifeforms had to gain energy using other elements, such as arsenic, which was likely more common in the oceans at that time.

"'We found the genetic signatures of pathways that are still there, remnants of the past ocean that have been maintained until today," Saunders said.

Comment: I assume God provided this form of metabolism in advance of the appearance of oxygen, which He obviously would know it was arriving later on.

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2556 views

A new artic le about this research:

https://theconversation.com/ancient-microbial-life-used-arsenic-to-thrive-in-a-world-wi...

"Our team of geologists, physicists and biologists had found hints in fossilized stromatolites that arsenic was the chemical of choice for ancient photosynthesis and respiration. But modern-day versions of these microbial communities still live on Earth today. Perhaps one of these used arsenic and could offer proof for our theory?

***

"In 2014, our team found the first clue that stromatolites were produced by arsenic-assisted photosynthesis and respiration. We collected pieces of 2.72-billion-year-old stromatolites from the pre-oxygen world by drilling into an ancient reefs in the Outback of Australia.

***

"Our destination was Laguna La Brava, a very salty shallow lake deep into the harsh desert. A shallow stream, fed by a volcanic groundwater spring, led into the lake. The streambed was a unique, deep purple color. The color came from a microbial mat, thriving quite happily in waters that contained unusually high amounts of arsenic, sulfur and lithium, but missing one important element – oxygen.

"We cut a piece of the mat and looked for evidence of minerals. A drop of acid made the minerals fizz – carbonates! – this microbe community was forming stromatolites. So our team went to work, camping out at the site for days at a time.

***

"All that was left was to show that the two types of arsenic could be detected in the modern stromatolites. We went back to France, and using an X-ray emission technique made chemical maps from the Chilean samples. Every experiment we performed supported the presence of a vigorous arsenic cycle in the absence of oxygen in this unique modern stromatolite. This validates, beyond doubt, the idea that the fossil Australian samples that we studied in 2014 held evidence of an active arsenic cycle in deep time on our young planet."

Comment: Before oxygen and photo synthesis there had to be another method to be designed.

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1846 views

A branch of the Chlamydia family:

https://phys.org/news/2020-03-chlamydia-related-bacteria-deep-arctic-ocean.html

"Chlamydia and related bacteria, collectively called Chlamydiae, and all studied members of this group depend on interactions with other organisms to survive. Chlamydiae specifically interact with organisms such as animals, plants and fungi, and including microscopic organisms like amoeba, algae and plankton. Chlamydiae spend a large part of their lives inside the cells (also one cell?) of their hosts, humans, but also of koala bears. Most knowledge about Chlamydiae is based on studies of pathogenic lineages in the lab. But do Chlamydiae also exist in other environments? The new research published in Current Biology shows that Chlamydiae can be found in the most unexpected of places.

"An international group of researchers report the discovery of numerous new species of Chlamydiae growing in deep Arctic Ocean sediments, in absence of any obvious host organisms. The researchers had been exploring microbes that live over 3 km below the ocean surface and several meters into the ocean seafloor sediment during an expedition to Loki's Castle, a deep-sea hydrothermal vent field located in the Arctic Ocean in-between Iceland, Norway, and Svalbard. This environment is devoid of oxygen and macroscopic life forms. Unexpectedly, the research team came across highly abundant and diverse relatives of Chlamydia. "Finding Chlamydiae in this environment was completely unexpected, and of course begged the question what on earth were they doing there?"

***

"Unfortunately, the researchers have as of yet been unable to grow these Chlamydiae or take images of them. "Even if these Chlamydiae are not associated with a host organism, we expect that they require compounds from other microbes living in the marine sediments. Additionally, the environment they live in is extreme, without oxygen and under high pressure, this makes growing them a challenge," explains Thijs Ettema. Nevertheless, the discovery of Chlamydiae in this unexpected environment challenges the current understanding of the biology of this ancient group of bacteria, and hints that additional Chlamydiae are awaiting to be discovered. "

Comment: The bush of life grows and most likely is vastly underestimated. The earliest bacterial life forms indicate how the start of life was built on them and they are still playing a very important vital role. We can't without them.

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2225 views

More discoveries:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/04/200402080506.htm

"Newly discovered single-celled creatures living deep beneath the seafloor have provided clues about how to find life on Mars. These bacteria were discovered living in tiny cracks inside volcanic rocks after researchers perfected a new method cutting rocks into ultrathin slices to study under a microscope. Researchers estimate that the rock cracks are home to a community of bacteria as dense as that of the human gut, about 10 billion bacterial cells per cubic centimeter.

***

"Undersea volcanoes spew out lava at approximately 1,200 degrees Celsius (2,200 degrees Fahrenheit), which eventually cracks as it cools down and becomes rock. The cracks are narrow, often less than 1 millimeter (0.04 inch) across. Over millions of years, those cracks fill up with clay minerals, the same clay used to make pottery. Somehow, bacteria find their way into those cracks and multiply.

"'These cracks are a very friendly place for life. Clay minerals are like a magic material on Earth; if you can find clay minerals, you can almost always find microbes living in them," explained Suzuki.

The microbes identified in the cracks are aerobic bacteria, meaning they use a process similar to how human cells make energy, relying on oxygen and organic nutrients. (my bold)

***

"Then, a drill cut down 125 meters below the seafloor and pulled out core samples, each about 6.2 centimeters across. The first 75 meters beneath the seafloor were mud sediment and then researchers collected another 40 meters of solid rock.

"Depending on the location, the rock samples were estimated to be 13.5 million, 33.5 million and 104 million years old. The collection sites were not near any hydrothermal vents or sub-seafloor water channels, so researchers are confident the bacteria arrived in the cracks independently rather than being forced in by a current. The rock core samples were also sterilized to prevent surface contamination using an artificial seawater wash and a quick burn, a process Suzuki compares to making aburi (flame-seared) sushi.

***

"The bacteria appeared as glowing green spheres tightly packed into tunnels that glow orange, surrounded by black rock. That orange glow comes from clay mineral deposits, the "magic material" giving bacteria an attractive place to live.

"Whole genome DNA analysis identified the different species of bacteria that lived in the cracks. Samples from different locations had similar, but not identical, species of bacteria. Rocks at different locations are different ages, which may affect what minerals have had time to accumulate and therefore what bacteria are most common in the cracks.

"Suzuki and his colleagues speculate that the clay mineral-filled cracks concentrate the nutrients that the bacteria use as fuel. This might explain why the density of bacteria in the rock cracks is eight orders of magnitude greater than the density of bacteria living freely in mud sediment where seawater dilutes the nutrients."

Comment: Am article about a study thinking about finding life on Mars. But its point for us is the amazing tenacity of life on Earth. These are aerobic organisms!!! The designer did a great job.

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2150 views

Relatives of these guys make useful products with hydrogen as the energy source, not oxygen:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/03/200330152141.htm

"Microbiologists have discovered how the bacterium Acetobacterium woodii uses hydrogen in a kind of cycle to conserve energy. The bacterium lives in an environment without oxygen, and thanks to hydrogen cycling, it can exist independent of other species of bacteria.

"They make sauerkraut sour, turn milk into yogurt and cheese, and give rye bread its intensive flavour: bacteria that ferment nutrients instead of using oxygen to extract their energy. Acetobacterium woodii (short: A. woodii) is one of these anaerobic living microbes. Cheese and bread are not its line of business -- it lives far from oxygen in the sediments on the floor of the ocean, and can also be found in sewage treatment plants and the intestines of termites.

"These biotopes are teeming with microbes that use the organic substances to their advantage in different ways. A number of bacteria ferment sugars, fatty acids and alcohols to acetic acid, also creating hydrogen (H2) in the process. In higher concentration, however, hydrogen inhibits the fermentation -- too much hydrogen stops the fermentation reaction. For this reason, fermenting bacteria live together with microbes that depend on precisely this hydrogen, methanogens, for example, that create methane from hydrogen and carbon dioxide and thus gain energy. Both partners profit from this association -- and are simultaneously so dependent on each other that neither one can survive without the other.

"A. woodii masters both disciplines of the anaerobic "hydrogen association": it can ferment organic substances into acetic acid, and can also form acetic acid from carbon dioxide and hydrogen. In doing so, A. woodii recycles the important hydrogen within its own cell, as has now been discovered.

***

"'Though the 'hydrogen recycling' we discovered, A. woodii possesses a maximum of metabolic flexibility," says the Frankfurt experimenter Dr Anja Wiechmann. "In one cycle, it can both create and use hydrogen itself, or utilise hydrogen from external sources. This makes it capable of living both from organic as well as solely from inorganic substances."

"Professor Volker Müller explains: "Our findings have implications far beyond the study of Acetobacterium woodii. There have already been speculations that many ancient life forms possess the kind of metabolism that we have described in A. woodii. This is assumed, for example for the Asgard archaea that were just discovered a few years ago on the seabed off of California. Our investigations provide the first evidence that these paths of metabolism actually exist.'"

Comment: It seems early life came with many alternatives of metabolism in early bacteria, allowing them to survive and exist today in helpful roles in biomes and in econiches. Oxygen is the final energy choice for most organisms, but it is a surprising result of evolution since oxygen is so toxic to begin with. Once again a designer of life is the best answer for living oraganisms contain antioxident mechanisms for protection.

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2149 views

In the ocean floor:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/12/201203144239.htm

"An international research team that included three scientists from the University of Rhode Island's Graduate School of Oceanography has discovered single-celled microorganisms in a location where they didn't expect to find them.

"'Water boils on the (Earth's) surface at 100 degrees Celsius, and we found organisms living in sediments at 120 degrees Celsius," said URI Professor of Oceanography Arthur Spivack, who led the geochemistry efforts of the 2016 expedition organized by the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology and Germany's MARUM-Center for Marine and Environmental Sciences at the University of Bremen. The study was carried out as part of the work of Expedition 370 of the International Ocean Discovery Program.

***

"The research published in Science today focused on the Nankai Trough off the coast of Japan, where the deep-sea scientific vessel, Chinkyu, drilled a hole 1,180 meters deep to reach sediment at 120 degrees Celsius.

***

"According to the study, sediments that lie deep below the ocean floor are harsh habitats. Temperature and pressure steadily increase with depth, while the energy supply becomes increasingly scarce. It has only been known for about 30 years that, in spite of these conditions, microorganisms do inhabit the seabed at depths of several kilometers. The deep biosphere is still not well understood, and this brings up fundamental questions: Where are the limits of life, and what factors determine them? To study how high temperatures affect life in the low-energy deep biosphere over the long-term, extensive deep-sea drilling is necessary.

"'Only a few scientific drilling sites have yet reached depths where temperatures in the sediments are greater than 30 degrees Celsius," explains study leader Hinrichs of MARUM. "The goal of the T-Limit Expedition, therefore, was to drill a thousand-meter deep hole into sediments with a temperature of up to 120 degrees Celsius -- and we succeeded.'"

Comment: We boil water to purify it. Glad these guys aren't around to bother us. It goes to show God made sure life was tough enough to survive here and evolve us under His direction.

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1870 views

Making hydrogen gas and combing it with carbon dioxide:

https://phys.org/news/2020-12-hydrogen-supported-life-beneath-glaciers.html

"The work examines the ways water and microbes interact with the bedrock beneath glaciers, using samples of sediment taken from glacial sites in Canada and Iceland.

"'We kept finding organisms in these systems that were supported by hydrogen gas," said Boyd of the inspiration for the project. "It initially didn't make sense, because we couldn't figure out where that hydrogen gas was coming from under these glaciers."

"A team of researchers, including Boyd, later discovered that through a series of physical and chemical processes, hydrogen gas is produced as the silica-rich bedrock underneath glaciers is ground into tiny mineral particles by the weight of the ice on top of it. When those mineral particles combine with glacial meltwater, they let off hydrogen.

"What became even more fascinating to Boyd and Dunham was that microbial communities under the glaciers could combine that hydrogen gas with carbon dioxide to generate more organic matter, called biomass, through a process called chemosynthesis. Chemosynthesis is similar to how plants generate biomass from carbon dioxide through photosynthesis, although chemosynthesis does not require sunlight.

***

"'The organisms we were interested in rely on hydrogen gas as food to grow, and most are also anaerobes, meaning oxygen will kill them," said Dunham,

***

"'Considering that glaciers and ice sheets cover about 10% of the Earth's landmass today, and a much larger fraction at times in the planet's past, microbial activities such as the ones Eric measured are likely to have had a major impact on Earth's climate, both today and in the past," said Boyd. "We've known for a while that microorganisms living beneath ice sheets or glaciers can fix carbon, but we never really understood how. What Eric's pioneering work shows is that not only are these organisms completely self-sustainable in the sense that they can generate their own fixed carbon, they also don't need sunlight to do it like the rest of the biosphere that we're familiar with.'"

Comment: Extremeophiles never cease to amaze.

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1868 views

Eating rock:

https://www.insidescience.org/news/life-lava-caves-ignores-food-surface-eats-rock-instead

"researchers found that many bacteria growing on the walls of lava caves spurn the feast flowing over them. Instead, they produce their own energy from surrounding minerals or dissolved chemicals and build the molecules they need using carbon in the air or rock.

"'This means that even in a very well-connected environment in the shallow subsurface, we still have evidence for life that is very independent from the surface living and thriving," said Matthew Selensky, a geobiologist and doctoral candidate at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

***

"'Organisms that use other sources of energy besides solar energy exist pretty much everywhere on the planet," said Caitlin Casar, who earned her doctorate in the same lab as Selensky but was not involved in the new study. "You can find them at the surface of the Earth, you can find them in soil, you can find them deep in the Earth's crust, you can find them at the bottom of the ocean, in the ocean's water column, in the air."

***

"...the researchers found that the water seeping in from the surface was full of carbon that had been fixed by plants or other photosynthetic organisms using the Calvin cycle. Some cave features appeared to contain microbes that lived off this surface food, "sort of fighting for table scraps," said Selensky. But in biofilms, some types of molecules the researchers examined had C-13 levels that were much lower. This indicates that a large fraction of the bacteria in the biofilms were surviving off the minerals and CO2 in the cave -- a lifestyle known as chemolithoautotrophy, or lithoautotrophy for short, according to Selensky.

"'The assumption for a lot of people is that if you're on the surface or close to the surface, you have this amazing energy source, the sun … and essentially photosynthesizers can outcompete everything else," he said. "I do think that lithoautotrophy is almost an underestimated metabolism in these environments.'"

Comment: no surprise to us. Organisms can live anywhere they wish. Life was designed to appear and survive from the beginning. Only by design.

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1557 views

New study:

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2302438-remarkable-trove-of-species-found-living-b...

"An astonishing variety of marine life has been discovered on the seabed in the darkness hundreds of metres below Antarctica’s ice shelves, including corals, clams, sea mosses, snails and worms.

"In 2018, a German research team drilled holes in the Ekström ice shelf using hot water and collected samples from two sites on the seabed beneath. An analysis of the samples suggests the environment is home to 77 species – a greater number than found during all previous studies below Antarctica’s ice put together.

“'It’s a tantalising view of one of our least-known habitats,” says David Barnes at the British Antarctic Survey, who studied the organisms under the microscope. “These two samples are very rich. The thing that really leaps out is just how rich the bryozoans – the sea moss animals – are.”

"Radiocarbon dating shows some of the bryozoans are several thousand years old. Most of the species found are immobile, so their discovery in such a hostile and low-food environment suggests they are surviving on phytoplankton carried by poorly understood currents beneath the ice shelves.

"They appear to be growing just as fast as the same species found growing on open-water continental shelves, to Barnes’s surprise. He says it shows how long life can persist with very little food and by conserving energy.

"The research follows another study earlier this year that found a surprising array of sponges on a boulder deep beneath Antarctica’s ice. The variety of life found this time suggests that environments below the ice are more habitable than previously thought, says Barnes. “Perhaps life is capable of surviving much more ice cover than we thought was the case,” he says.

"However, Barnes and his colleagues note that this undisturbed and biodiverse habitat beneath the ice “could be the first habitat to go extinct” as Antarctica’s ice shelves collapse due to climate change."

Comment: Just more proof as to how tough life is. Not surprising, since original life started under severe conditions.

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1167 views

Process only partially understood:

https://www.sciencealert.com/common-microbes-have-been-found-producing-oxygen-without-s...

"At the moment, the researchers aren't certain how the microbes are pulling off this trick, and the amount of oxygen produced appears to be relatively small (just enough for their own survival) – but it does look to be different to the few oxygen-without-sunlight processes that we already know about.

"What the new pathway does show is that the oxygen production from N. maritimus gets linked to its production of gaseous nitrogen. The microbes are somehow converting ammonia (NH3) into nitrite (NO2-) – a process they use to metabolize energy – in an oxygen-depleted environment.

"In turn, this requires them to make their own oxygen, which the team detected traces of, along with the byproduct of nitrogen gas (N2).

"This process removes bioavailable nitrogen from the environment – and that's a new wrinkle in the nitrogen cycle, which underpins all ecosystems. This finding could have "far-reaching" consequences, and that needs more investigation."

Comment: obviously life is made to be tough. There is much to be learned ab out extremeophiles.

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1163 views

A review of current findings:

https://www.sciencealert.com/dna-shed-by-deep-sea-organisms-reveals-an-abyss-teeming-wi...

"Sweeping the ocean floor at hundreds of points throughout the world, researchers have revealed an astonishing diversity of microscopic life thriving in the deepest and darkest parts of our planet.

"The sediment collected at each spot was analyzed for environmental DNA (eDNA), which marine animals shed as they go about their lives. While sea creatures cast off some of that eDNA, among that material is also evidence of microbes and other tiny animals that make up the shadowy ecosystem at the bottom of the world.

***

"In the end, the researchers found most eukaryotic organisms living on the ocean floor are unknown to modern science. What's more, it looks as though the ocean's abyss is home to at least three times the diversity of microbial life as the waters above.

"It's the first time scientists have put together a consistent molecular dataset of the ocean realm on a such global scale, and while the meta-analysis isn't comprehensive, it's an impressive start.

"'We compared our deep-sea benthic DNA sequences to all reference sequences available for known eukaryotes," says geneticist Jan Pawlowski from the University of Geneva in Switzerland.

"'Our data indicates that nearly two-third[s] of this benthic diversity cannot be assigned to any known group, revealing a major gap in our knowledge of marine biodiversity."

***

"The current analysis mostly looked for smaller-sized organisms, like diatoms and dinoflagellates, and tiny animals, like worms and small molluscs. The diversity of plankton found matches other evidence suggesting the deep sea is also home to a diversity of larger animals.

"The tiniest creatures, however, are often the glue that holds food webs together. They are also critical regulators of the global climate, helping to bury carbon in the deep ocean. (my bold)

"'These deep-ocean sediment assemblages comprise not only taxa that are known to be important drivers of the biological carbon pump but also several taxonomic and functional groups that have been overlooked in what is arguably one of the most fundamental ecological processes of the world ocean," the authors write.

"'Together, our results highlight the [deep ocean sediment] as one of Earth's richest modern ecosystems and fossil archives.'" (my bold)

Comment: Again, an example of the diversity of life where I believe life started.

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976 views

QUOTES "The tiniest creatures, however, are often the glue that holds food webs together. They are also critical regulators of the global climate, helping to bury carbon in the deep ocean. (David’s bold)

"'Together, our results highlight the [deep ocean sediment] as one of Earth's richest modern ecosystems and fossil archives[/b].'" (David’s bold)

DAVID: Again, an example of the diversity of life where I believe life started.

Another eye-opening article, for which many thanks. I also appreciate your two bolds and your comment. The diversity of ecosystems and of life forms is truly a source of wonderment, regardless of whatever theories we may devise about how it all happened.

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967 views

A list:

https://mindmatters.ai/2022/06/earths-weirdest-life-forms-show-that-et-life-is-possible/

"It’s not clear what The Blob at the Paris Zoo even is, in scientific terms. It has 720 sexes, no limbs, and no brain. Yet it makes decisions. Stranger still: “Polycephalum’s type of organism is thought to have existed for roughly a billion years though it has only been studied intensively in recent decades. It is technically called a “protist” (a catch-all category for life forms that are hard to classify). It makes decisions with no apparent source of intelligence.”

"Among the life forms known as extremophiles are many creatures that no scientist expected to find. That includes the Deinococcus radiodurans bacterium which can survive “15,000 gray dose of radiation, where 10 grays would kill a human and it takes over 1,000 grays to kill a cockroach. This species, in fact, is exemplary in many ways, encompassing also the ability to survive cold, dehydration, vacuum and acid.” (LiveScience, (August 2, 2011) From the BBC (September 22, 2020),we learned that some radiodurans survived three years on the outside of a spacecraft.

"Loriciferans can survive with no oxygen.

"Deep in Canada’s Kidd Mine 350 miles northwest of Toronto live microbes that breathe sulfur and eat fool’s gold (pyrites) – (NBC News, September 7, 2019)

"They’re not alone down there, according to NBC News: “In the eye-opening report, a team led by Cara Magnabosco, a geobiologist at the Swiss technical university ETH Zurich, estimated that some 5 x 10^29 cells live in the deep Earth.”

"One fellow deep Earth dweller, Geogemma barossii can stand temperatures of up to 250 degrees Fahrenheit (121 Celsius). They can be viewed in the video below at 39 seconds.

"A fungus living at Chernobyl eats radiation: “In 1991, the strange fungus was found growing up the walls of the reactor, which baffled scientists due to the extreme, radiation-heavy environment. Researchers eventually realized that not only was the fungi impervious to the deadly radiation, it seemed to be attracted to it.'”

Comment: My view is if life started in the Hadean period of chaos on early Earth, it had to have very tough aspects of its resistence to adversity. That life is here is a miracle I would attribute to a designing God.

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643 views

Amassing how many organisms it hides:

https://www.quantamagazine.org/in-a-fierce-desert-microbe-crusts-show-how-life-tamed-th...

"...Patrick Jung couldn’t get the checkerboard out of his head. Having spotted what looked like lichens on some of the dark pebbles, Jung suspected that something more might inhabit them. Eventually, he picked up a rock, dribbled some water on it from a bottle, and peered at it through his handheld magnifying lens. The face of the black stone erupted with green. The rubble had come alive.

"Jung whipped a photosynthesis monitor out of his pack. One tap of its fluorescent blue sensor confirmed that something within the rocks was converting carbon dioxide to oxygen. After Jung’s colleagues, Büdel included, replicated the experiment, they all danced with excitement under the desert sun...All around them, the dark patches repeated across the landscape, each one filled with its own microscopic universe.

***

"...dedicated to the study of the unusual community of microbes, now known as grit crust. His team has worked to understand the extreme adaptations that have allowed these microorganisms to inhabit a land so infamously hostile, where they are refreshed only occasionally by sips of fog. The answers they have uncovered offer clues about how life may have first found a grip on our planet’s surface billions of years ago.

***

"The discovery of the grit crust transformed the desert for Gutiérrez Alvarado, who has patrolled it every day for the last decade. “It’s not only rocks, not only empty space,” he said, peering out over the patches of pebbles. “Everything is breathing now.”

***

"Driving through Pan de Azúcar with Gutiérrez Alvarado is like riding in a geological time machine. Ancient volcanic caverns from one epoch fade to rolling hills of eroded sand from another, between the hills peeks an outcropping of the mother bedrock, a heap of quartz spiced with different minerals. At its feet lie its progeny, smaller chunks that have broken off over millions of years. Below them sits a parade of progressively smaller rocks, all the way down to the earring-size grains that first captivated Jung. The pebbles, which litter the desert floor, are known locally as “maicillo” and in English as “grit.” The substrate is amply porous, offering plenty of cracks and corners for microbes to nuzzle into. Wedged into the crevices of each grade of rock are tiny thickets of green and black life.

"...From DNA samples, he deduced that the grit crust is composed of several hundred species of cyanobacteria, green algae and fungi — including several previously unknown lichen combinations...his colleagues sliced the stones thin for imaging. The photos showed how individual fungal hyphae had drilled deep into the rocks, carving out networks of branching canals.

"At first glance, the grit crust could seem like a routine example of what researchers call a biological soil crust, or “biocrust” — a community of coexisting bacteria, fungi, algae and other microorganisms that caps the soil in coherent sheets. Around 12% of Earth’s land is covered by biocrusts. Ecologists often refer to these colonies as the planet’s “living skin.”

"Over the last century, scientists have identified biocrusts around the globe and worked to understand their role in shaping ecosystems. They’ve learned that the crusts anchor soil grains in place and provide the organisms growing in that soil with essential nutrients such as carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus. In 2012, Büdel and colleagues estimated that biocrusts soak up and recycle around 7% of all the carbon and nearly half of all the nitrogen that is chemically “fixed” by terrestrial vegetation. The role of the biocrusts in procuring digestible nitrogen is particularly critical in arid deserts: Elsewhere, lightning can often convert atmospheric nitrogen to nitrates, but in the deserts, electrical storms are rare.

***

“...van den Brink marveled. “How does anything survive here?” An enormous article filled with much more information about how these plants survive.

"The answer is the distinctive thick fog that rolls up the Chilean coastline, a weather phenomenon known locally as the camanchaca. With so little rainfall, all life in Pan de Azúcar ultimately depends on whatever moisture the fog carries. The guanaco, for example, relies on sips of water that is trapped by mosses clinging to cacti, which grow in soil fertilized by grit crust.

***

“'The grit crust is setting a new threshold for conditions that make life possible,” Jung said.

***

"While all biocrusts perform some degree of weathering, the larger grains of the grit crust are especially suited for it. The process reveals the full potential of microbes to impact their environment. A microbial skin can glue together pebbles, break them down into soil and fertilize that soil with essential nutrients. In effect, the crust can “terraform” the desert.

***

"Gregory Retallack, an emeritus professor, believes he has found evidence for communities resembling biocrusts in fossilized soils (or “paleosols”) as far back as 3.7 billion years ago — challenging the common assumption that life originated in the sea. “The evidence from paleosols is pretty clear that there were all sorts of things on land, even very early on,” he said. “You can see these microbial crust fabrics just with the naked eye.'”

Comment: this establishes that these were the first land plants

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Feed from excrement above:

https://phys.org/news/2023-07-animals-ocean-twilight-zone-upcycled.html

"Living at the edge of darkness, the community of microbes and tiny animals in the ocean's twilight zone upcycle nutrients to ensure their survival. A study led by researchers at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa revealed that small, free-floating animals called zooplankton rely mainly on an even smaller class of organisms, called microzooplankton, to consolidate the sparse waste products in the water and transform it into higher-quality food.

***

"The twilight zone, about 200–1,000 meters below the ocean surface, is the layer where the well-lit surface ocean transitions to the ocean's dark interior. In this zone, it is too dark for plants to grow, so the communities that live there are almost entirely reliant on material produced in the overlying water to survive.

"To obtain their food, microzooplankton, which are about the size of a human red blood cell, recycle old organic material that settles from above—mostly fragments of excrement from animals living at shallower depths. This process concentrates nutrients in an environment that is otherwise a food desert for other, larger organisms.

***

"'We discovered how the community of zooplankton living in the twilight zone of the Northeast Pacific makes a living, despite inhabiting a notably unproductive region where the supply of food from the surface is exceedingly low," said Shea.

"The zooplankton, which are about the size of a sesame seed and often smaller, eat the microzooplankton, which are relatively nutritious compared to the detritus they feed on. In this way, the food web is highly efficient and organized around the recycling of relatively low-quality food that exists in this environment.

"'Although we know that microzooplankton exist below the well-lit surface ocean, they are not very abundant, and so it has previously been difficult to evaluate whether they are an active component of the community," said Shea. "So, it was exciting to find that they were key contributors to this deep sea food web."

"Regions of the ocean where the plankton community is more efficiently utilizing organic matter, such as the study area, are places where the ocean has a naturally lower capacity to absorb some of the carbon dioxide produced by humans. "So understanding how zooplankton communities process carbon, which, to them, represents food and energy, helps us to understand the role of the ocean in absorbing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere," added Shea."

Comment: a perfect food chain in a living ecosystem following the rule, everyone has to eat.

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Putting salt on the outside:

https://phys.org/news/2023-10-reveal-common-shrub-efficiently-harvests.html

"The identification of this unique mechanism, in which the plant excretes salts to extract and condense water onto the surface of its leaves, has the potential to inspire the development of new technologies, and improve existing ones such as cloud seeding, to harness atmospheric water resources.

"Tamarix aphylla, or athel tamarisk, is a halophytic desert shrub, meaning it can survive in hypersaline conditions. Over time, the plant has evolved to take full advantage of the prevalent humidity and fog occurrences in the UAE.

"Many plants and animals that inhabit arid regions have developed water-harvesting mechanisms and morphophysiological traits which have given them the ability to utilize abundant, untapped sources of water such as fog and dew. The fundamental principles governing this natural water collection serve as an inspiration for emerging water-collection technologies, which are developed to maximize the efficiency of the existing methods for harvesting aerial humidity.

"In the paper titled "Harvesting of Aerial Humidity with Natural Hygroscopic Salt Excretions," published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , the researchers present their exploration of the physicochemical aspects of salt release and water collection mechanisms by Tamarix aphylla that has allowed it to thrive in hypersaline sands.

"The plant absorbs saline water from the soil through its roots, filters out the salt, and expels the concentrated salt solution onto the outer surface of its leaves. The researchers found that as the salt solution undergoes evaporation, it transforms into a hygroscopic crystalline mixture composed of at least 10 different minerals.

"It was discovered that some of these salt crystals have the ability to attract moisture from the air even when the humidity levels are reasonably low (~55% relative humidity). This moisture condenses onto the surface of the plant's leaves and is then absorbed."

Comment: How did this adapt? Growing at the edges of the saline desert and gradually moving in makes sense. Salt attracts water which means extruding it to leaf surface is an obvious purposeful move. Could enough mutations have occurred to allow this happen? That is the issue only a study of mutation rates can answer. It is adaptation or God's design?

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May be a very ancient species:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/11/231110112455.htm

"'This bacterium subsists on phosphite oxidation, and as far as we know, exclusively on this reaction. It covers its energy metabolism this way, and can build up its cell substance from CO2 at the same time," explains Schink. "This bacterium is an autotrophic organism, like a plant. It does, however, not need light like a plant, as it draws its energy from phosphite oxidation." Surprisingly, it turned out that the bacterium is not only a new species, but actually forms an entirely new genus of bacteria.

***

"They produced a pure culture of this new bacterial strain, in which they were finally able to identify the key enzyme that triggers the oxidation of phosphite to phosphate.

"'The breakthrough came with Nicolai Müller and his enzyme experiments," says David Schleheck. Nicolai Müller succeeded in clearly demonstrating the enzyme's activity, thereby uncovering the biochemical mechanism behind the key enzyme. Olga Mayans and Jennifer Fleming created a three-dimensional model of its enzyme structure and active centre to understand the reaction pathway.

"'What was very surprising was that during its oxidation, phosphite is apparently coupled directly to the energy-carrier precursor AMP, whereby the energy carrier ADP is created. In a subsequent reaction, two of the generated ADPs are converted to one ATP, on which the organism ultimately lives," Nicolai Müller outlines the reaction pathway.

***

"...the research team thinks that this type of metabolism is by no means new, but very old, even ancient: around 2.5 billion years old.

"'It is assumed that in the early days of evolution, when the Earth was cooling down, phosphorus was still present to a large extent in a partially reduced form and was only later gradually oxidized. The metabolism we have now discovered fits very well into the early phase of the evolution of microorganisms," Bernhard Schink explains.

"The biochemical mechanism that the bacterium uses for its metabolism is therefore not new, but has most probably been preserved from the primeval times of our planet: back when life on our planet began and the first microorganisms had to feed on inorganic compounds such as phosphite. Thus the new scientific findings provide clues to the early biochemical evolution on our planet. In addition, they provide the key to a biochemical mechanism that makes life possible in very hostile places, possibly even on alien planets."

Comment: another example of how life can use many avenues for energy production.

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New Extremeophiles (Introduction)

New Extremeophiles: Antarctica

New Extremeophiles

New Extremeophiles

New Extremeophiles: early life

New Extremeophiles: live on sulfates

New Extremeophiles: 13,000 feet deep in Pacific

New Extremeophiles: living on electrons

New Extremeophiles: living on electrons

New Extremeophiles: living on electrons

New Extremeophiles: four examples

New Extremeophiles: four examples

New Extremeophiles: four examples

New Extremophiles: possible means of evolution

New Extremeophiles: antarctic insects

New Extremophiles: under antarctic ice in lakes

New Extremophiles: Arctic snails!

New Extremophiles: Arctic snails!

New Extremophiles: Arctic snails!

New Extremeophiles: living on electrons

New Extremophiles: living by expelling electrons to rocks

New Extremophiles: living in lakes under miles of ice

Old Extremophiles: using arsenic for energy

Old Extremophiles: using arsenic for energy

New Extremophiles: ocean floor three kilometers down

New Extremophiles: ocean floor three kilometers down

Useful Extremeophiles: living on hydrogen

New Extremeophiles: living at extreme heat

New Extremeophiles: living under glaciers

New Extremophiles: living in lava tubes

New Extremophiles: living under Antarctic ice

New Extremophiles: ocean bottom dwellers make own oxygen

New Extremophiles: so many ocean bottom dwellers

New Extremophiles: so many ocean bottom dwellers

New Extremophiles: a few more

New Extremophiles: crustal grit

New Extremophiles: dark ocean dwellers

New Extremophiles: sopping up water in a desert

New Extremophiles: bacteria living on phosphorus.