Slashdot Mirror
Bacteria Found Alive In Ice 120,000 Years Old
FiReaNGeL notes research presented this morning at Penn State on the discovery of a new, ultra-small species of bacteria that has survived for more than 120,000 years within the ice of a Greenland glacier at a depth of nearly two miles. From the psu.edu announcement: "The microorganism's ability to persist in this low-temperature, high-pressure, reduced-oxygen, and nutrient-poor habitat makes it particularly useful for studying how life, in general, can survive in a variety of extreme environments on Earth and possibly elsewhere in the solar system. This new species is among the ubiquitous, yet mysterious, ultra-small bacteria, which are so tiny that they are able to pass through microbiological filters. Called Chryseobacterium greenlandensis, the species is related genetically to certain bacteria found in fish, marine mud, and the roots of some plants."
Have another reason to point and laugh.
"This is a great discovery. There is nothing at all to worry about." said the oddly-behaving scientist who discovered the sled dog.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
But..... the earth is only 6000 years old.
Somebody is lying!
What power has law where only money rules.
Sure, the bacteria survived. But how do you think it felt, being trapped in ice for 120,000 years? The first few years were probably ok. After that, it probably got really good at checkers. After the 1000th year, it proved that P=NP. At year 10,000, it dreamed of starting its own civilization. But then it started to go mad. Mad. MAD, I tell you. Now that it is free, the bacteria wants nothing but to seek revenge upon all other life forms for continuing to prosper and evolve while it was trapped beneath the ice. Buried alive. Buried alive...
(Kaaaaahn....)
Hell, I've got bacteria in my refrigerator that's as old as that.
This ain't rocket surgery.
I would hate to discover that this was a rare bacteria that produces greenhouse gasses... and will begin to reproduce rapidly now that it's free.
Anything you say will be held against you.
In soviet Russia, bacteria finds you frozen in ice thousands of years later.
If you put the bacteria into a radioactive, poisonous desert with a rat, a cockroach, Cher and a lawyer, which would survive longest, and would it actually eat the others?
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
I am sure after all these years, this bacteria is either:
A) Eager to evolve into an organism capable of having sex.
B) Eager to start posting regularly on Slashdot.
Yes, these options are mutually exclusive.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
I can just see it now...
Breaking news:
Scientists have genetically engineered flesh-eating bacteria that is too small for scientists to detect. Drinking from your faucet is in advised as no filter can filter them out. Symptoms include explosive diarrhea then your eyeballs will fall out.
Bender: "I was enjoying it until you guys showed up!"
He wants his ice-cream back
To pass through a microbiological filter, how did they find it? The article states how they study the bacteria, but how did they know to process this one specific piece of ice for ancient bacteria? Were they just going through thousands of tons of ancient ice core and happened upon it by accident?
Meet new people, and kill them.
Same exact text, but with a picture, from physorg.
http://www.physorg.com/news131712233.html
"Cut one in half and count the rings ??" in a manner.
Depth of ice,number of layers and maybe radiological testing.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
How will this discovery save our bananas?
if it didn't then what's the purpose of staying "alive" for 120000 years? Evolution is not teleological (which means "purposive" or "goal-oriented"). This bacterium happened to be able to survive long periods in the freezing cold due to some mutation or another. This would be a big evolutionary advantage because it could then live and reproduce in areas where most other things cannot.
Some of these bacteria got frozen for 120,000 years. They weren't waiting for it to thaw out; they're just out there living in the cold regions where nothing else can live, and sticking it out even when it gets too cold for them.
Analogously, imagine that there is some primitive tribe of humans with no knowledge of climatology, currently living in tropical or desert climes who, unbeknown to anyone, have a mutation which allows them to survive in hibernation in freezing cold temperatures, and then reawaken when it warms up again. They did not evolve this because they needed to survive freezing cold temperatures, they just have a genetic adaptation which is not disadvantageous, and might even correlate with some other adaptation which is advantageous. And because they live in warm climes, nobody knows they have this mutation.
Then say someday we enter another great ice age, so cold that everybody on Earth dies out, except this tribe, who barely manages to live on for thousands of years, frozen in the ice, due to their mutation. And then eventually the ice age ends and the world gets nice and warm, these people thaw out and start living their lives again.
Now imagine we're aliens watching this future Earth thaw out. We might ask, did these people know that an ice age was coming? No... they've probably never even heard of ice. So they certainly didn't know that the ice age they never expected was going to end eventually. So what's the purpose of them having this mutation that allowed them to stay "alive" frozen in the ice for thousands of years? The answer is that there was none; they didn't mean to have the mutation, and nobody meant for them to have the mutation, they just had it by chance, and as chance would have it it came in really handy when the whole world froze over and everybody but them died out, which is why they're still around for us to wonder about.
Or in short: They didn't get the mutation so that they could survive. They survived because they had the mutation.
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."