For Celt: Microbe Wakes Up After 120,000 Years
16 replies
Fin Dforum_veteranOPhttp://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20090615/sc_livescience/microbewakesupafter120000years
After more than 120,000 years trapped beneath a block of ice in Greenland, a tiny microbe has awoken. The long-lasting bacteria may hold clues to what life forms might exist on other planets.
The new bacteria species was found nearly 2 miles (3 km) beneath a Greenland glacier, where temperatures can dip well below freezing, pressure soars, and food and oxygen are scarce.
"We don't know what state they were in," said study team member Jean Brenchley of Pennsylvania State University. "They could've been dormant, or they could've been slowly metabolizing, but we don't know for sure."
Dormant would mean the bacteria were in a spore-like state in which there's not a lot of metabolism going on, so the bacteria wouldn't be reproducing much. It's possible the bacteria could have been slowly metabolizing and replicating.
Is this cool, scary, or both?
BigDogsHuntNew Member120,000 year old bacteria being exposed or released to our current time and world? I am going with scary WHEN this gets out.....(it always gets out in the movies)....!
BDH -
"To me, there are three things we all should do every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And Number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy.
"If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that's a full day. That's a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you're going to have something special."
Jimmy V. (Mar '93)
gafinfansubscriber"Finascious D wrote:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20090615/sc_livescience/microbewakesupafter120000years
Is this cool, scary, or both?
Yes and ...........
YES!:up:
This is the only thing I’ve learned: There’s only us. There’s no them. Despots and authoritarians need to make a “them” to have a straw man whom you are against. If you need to make an enemy of “them,” you’ve lost the spirit of us. - Ken Burns of PBS
![[deleted]](https://cdn.thephins.com/avatars/1.jpg){kind=small}
[deleted]luxury_boxThanks for the article brother. Bacterial spores are an amazing feat of nature.
I recently germinated spores that I isolated from mined sands from the Lane Mountain company. I sequenced the 16S rRNA gene and three of the organisms had previously been isolated from deep ocean deposits. Needless to say, it has been quite a while since Washington state was under water. ;)
Fin Dforum_veteran"Celtkin wrote:
Thanks for the article brother. Bacterial spores are an amazing feat of nature.
I recently germinated spores that I isolated from mined sands from the Lane Mountain company. I sequenced the 16S rRNA gene and three of the organisms had previously been isolated from deep ocean deposits. Needless to say, it has been quite a while since Washington state was under water. ;)
That is fascinating.
However, for us non microbiologists, is this cool, scary or both?:lol:
[deleted]luxury_box"Finascious D wrote:
That is fascinating.
However, for us non microbiologists, is this cool, scary or both?:lol:
In this case, just cool. These three organisms are still cruising around under the oceans off the coast of Japan and Greece (and probably many other places) but it does show the range of bacteria and, since these organisms, to the best of my knowledge, have only previously been isolated from marine environments, that they have probably been in spore form since the time when Washington state was under water. I am not sure when that was but my guess is that it was many moons ago.
azfinfanmangluxury_boxOkay Mal. Cut to the chase.
How long till Dinosaurs are roaming my backyard?
[deleted]luxury_boxI don't envision it being scary. Ancient microbes would probably not find humans to be good hosts and, given the temperature and environment from where these bugs were isolated (low oxygen, low nutrients), makes it even less likely. Ancient microbes would have to evolve a relationship with humans to be a threat and, the fact is, the overwhelming majority of microorganisms are not pathogenic.
unluckylucianoNew Member"azfinfanmang wrote:
Okay Mal. Cut to the chase.
How long till Dinosaurs are roaming my backyard?
:omg:
thanks to VO for the sick ass sigs. 
Charlie: If you're not as educated or as informed what you do is you start your own party and you yell the loudest.
BigDogsHuntNew Member"Celtkin wrote:
I don't envision it being scary. Ancient microbes would probably not find humans to be good hosts and, given the temperature and environment (low oxygen, low nutrients), makes it even less likely. Ancient microbes would have to evolve a relationship with humans to be a threat and, the fact is, the overwhelming majority of microorganisms are not pathogenic.
So what you are saying is that it would probably take modern day scientists studying these ancient bacteria and running tests on them and accidently introducing them to some proper temperature and environment that causes a reaction no one predicted thus reeking havic on our once non-infected species.
Pheww...luckily that isnt happening....:wink2:
BDH -
"To me, there are three things we all should do every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And Number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy.
"If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that's a full day. That's a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you're going to have something special."
Jimmy V. (Mar '93)
[deleted]luxury_box"azfinfanmang wrote:
Okay Mal. Cut to the chase.
How long till Dinosaurs are roaming my backyard?
Wouldn't it be cool to have a pet velociraptor to protect your home and family. :)
[deleted]luxury_box"BigDogsHunt wrote:
So what you are saying is that it would probably take modern day scientists studying these ancient bacteria and running tests on them and accidently introducing them to some proper temperature and environment that causes a reaction no one predicted thus reeking havic on our once non-infected species.
Pheww...luckily that isnt happening....:wink2:
Naw, bacteria are pretty specialized when it comes to temperature, nutritional needs, osmotic conditions, pressure, etc. If you isolated a bug at freezing temperatures, they probably lack the functional genes to make molecular chaperones to deal with a human's body temperature and, as such, die almost immediately when exposed to human body temperatures. ;)
azfinfanmangluxury_box"Celtkin wrote:
Wouldn't it be cool to have a pet velociraptor to protect your home and family. :)
And to think I am about to settle for a German Sheppard :lol:
jdang307subscriber"Celtkin wrote:
Wouldn't it be cool to have a pet velociraptor to protect your home and family. :)
How about two western digital velociraptors in my computer?
One day the super germ will break out watch. I know it. It'll be like Motaba.
unluckylucianoNew Member"Mari0k wrote:
Thats how scary movies start. lol
well in all fairness most people aren't afraid of things they know. they are afraid of the unknown................
thanks to VO for the sick ass sigs.
Charlie: If you're not as educated or as informed what you do is you start your own party and you yell the loudest.
"Celtkin wrote:
Wouldn't it be cool to have a pet velociraptor to protect your home and family. :)
Would rather have a Pit Triceritops.:up:
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