That’s the Headline:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20110113/sc_livescience/34000yearoldorganismsfoundburiedalive
It’s a tale that has all the trappings of a cult 1960s sci-fi movie: Scientists bring back ancient salt crystals, dug up from deep below Death Valley for climate research. The sparkling crystals are carefully packed away until, years later, a young, unknown researcher takes a second look at the 34,000-year-old crystals and discovers, trapped inside, something strange. Something … alive.
Thankfully this story doesn’t end with the destruction of the human race, but with a satisfied scientist finishing his Ph.D.
“It was actually a very big surprise to me,” said Brian Schubert, who discovered ancient bacteria living within tiny, fluid-filled chambers inside the salt crystals.
Salt crystals grow very quickly, imprisoning whatever happens to be floating - or living - nearby inside tiny bubbles just a few microns across, akin to naturally made, miniature snow-globes.
“It’s permanently sealed inside the salt, like little time capsules,” said Tim Lowenstein, a professor in the geology department at Binghamton University and Schubert’s advisor at the time.
Lowenstein said new research indicates this process occurs in modern saline lakes, further backing up Schubert’s astounding discovery, which was first revealed about a year ago. The new findings, along with details of Schubert’s work, are published in the January 2011 edition of GSA Today, the publication of the Geological Society of America.
Schubert, now an assistant researcher at the University of Hawaii, said the bacteria - a salt-loving sort still found on Earth today - were shrunken and small, and suspended in a kind of hibernation state.
Give it time. It might still end with the destruction of the human race.
The key to the microbes’ millennia-long survival may be their fellow captives - algae, of a group called Dunaliella.
“The most exciting part to me was when we were able to identify the Dunaliella cells in there,” Schubert said, “because there were hints that could be a food source.”
With the discovery of a potential energy source trapped alongside the bacteria, it has begun to emerge that, like an outlandish Dr. Seuss invention (hello, Who-ville), these tiny chambers could house entire, microscopic ecosystems.
Yeah, but what was keeping the algae going?
Wow…Okay, confession, I read the title of the OP wrong and was horribly confused…
As if we’d be that lucky…
Thankfully this story doesn’t end with the destruction of the human race, but with a satisfied scientist finishing his Ph.D.
“It was actually a very big surprise to me,” said Brian Schubert, who discovered ancient bacteria living within tiny, fluid-filled chambers inside the salt crystals.
Schubert: “Don’t. Worry. It’s. Perfectly. <glork> Safe.”
<furtively hides tentacle beneath lab coat>
the thread title needed a “and its pissed!” tacked onto the end for dramatic effect.
Oh, good. I’m not the only one.
The OP reminds me of these things . Got one for my mother years ago as a Mother’s Day gift and the damn thing went for at least two or three years that I know of…
Turek
January 14, 2011, 1:09am
7
Personally, I welcome our new salt-bacteria overlords.
I have one of those that I got for Christmas in '02. One of the two shrimp that it came with is still swimming along happily. Or whatever passes for happy in a shrimp that’s been imprisoned by himself in a 4 inch glass sphere for 8+ years.
I can only imagine the arguments those two had that led up to such a thing.
Me too, but I was just listening to my brothers trying to out-trash talk each other. So I think I have an excuse.
My mind has a second home in the gutter, so I too fell prey to this topic header.
I bet this salt would fetch a fortune in the haute-cuisine market.
Ale
January 14, 2011, 9:06am
11
I bet that bacteria is kicking itself for not putting its money on a compound interest bank account.
Well, bacteria aren’t known for being Einsteins.
But I just clicked out from the blowjob thread, so my mind was already in the gutter.