Monthly Archives: July 2019

Yellowstone National Park is famous for its hot springs, geysers, wildlife, and incredible geology. While the area is popular among visitors every year, scientists are also excited about the hot springs at this site as they create unique habitats for life. Surprisingly, this national park’s hot springs may hold clues to what conditions may have been like on Earth between 2 to 4 billion years ago. The temperatures of some hot springs at Yellowstone (up to the boiling point of water, 100°C) allow only certain organisms to flourish, as only the fittest can survive. In other words, microorganisms (algae, bacteria, fungi, archaea) living there need some essential adaptations. It turns out, these organisms that thrive in and around Yellowstone’s hot springs may be very similar to the organisms that survived and thrived on the early Earth.  Earth before 2.5 billion years ago looked a lot different than it does today.…

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All life on Earth has to respire. For us this means inhaling oxygen to fuel our metabolism and exhaling waste gases like carbon dioxide. When we do this, we move the energy  from the food we eat to the oxygen we breathe, creating a flow of energy that our cells use for growth. This is called respiration. However, not all life on Earth uses oxygen for this kind of respiration. These organisms have to find other ways to create electron flows to support their growth. One shocking method used by some bacteria is to produce biological nanowires. These nanowires act like wiring in your house and allow for electrons to pass from cells like Geobacter bacteria directly onto metals. This process is similar to plugging your phone into the wall to charge. Electrons flow from the source to your device. When the biological nanowires touch a metal, a circuit is…

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