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Ancient Ecosystem Found In Ice Pocket
ApharmdB writes "Beneath a glacier in Antarctica, scientists have discovered a community of microbes growing in frigid pools of salty water. It's a particularly tough environment, with no light, no oxygen, and extremely cold temperatures. But the microbes appear to live — and thrive — off a combination of iron and sulfur, according to a new study. The result of that strange metabolism is a brilliant red streak of cascading ice called Blood Falls."
Maybe no one has read it. In Odyssey 3001 (The Final Odyssey) Clarke wrote about a sulfur-based life forms on Jupiter's Europa moon.
This particular microbe, however, is not sulfur-based. "Sulfur-based" would indicate that its molecules are largely built out of sulfur (as ours are of carbon), whereas these microbes only utilize sulfur in their energy production.
Sorry, I misspoke when I said "Sulfur-based". The Europa critters in Odyssey 3001 metabolized sulfur, not sure of their composition. They were also said to be slower than earth life-forms, because metabolizing sulfur isn't as intensive as metabolizing oxygen.