South African Space-Like Microbes Found Deep Underground-Part II
Microbes come in all packages but the sphere is the easiest shape for it to handle, due to surface tension. Others can come in rods and spirals, but is causes a bit more work for the microbe and using up more energy to fight against the natural forces that “favor the sphere.” The interesting thing is that the Northam mine in South America seems to contain the more morphologically diverse assortment of bacteria—going beyond the common and form radically unique shapes—with a star-shaped cell containing four to nine points. A unique structure, it has not ever been seen before until now.
According to the article, the star shape has developed its shape as every microbe needs food to survive, needing to float about in each one’s individual environment in order to absorb its required nutrients for survival. And obviously, the more complicated the cell wall is the more difficulty there will be for it to eat. Most of them allow their cell membrane to diffuse the nutrients, with the spheres lacking surface area for a cell to exist. Complicated cells allow their cell wall to fold and bend, increasing in relation to its interior volume—allowing each complicated microbe to have more cell wall to absorb food. Such a case is the South Africa microbe.
Developing such an evolutionary process, the South Africa microbe developed its star-shape because its deep, underground environment is considered “nutrient poor”—requiring it to develop “clever strategies” in order out-compete nearby microbes for what food is available under the Earth’s subsurface. In a similar manner, searching for life in subsurface areas on Mars is being done by the NASA Phoenix Phoenix Lander, digging soil samples which are revealing clues about past or present life on the red planet. With the Martian Snow Queen area showing changes in the soil, things are finally beginning to show why it is there. Another mission is working on microbes is the ESA ExoMars rover, with plans to place a drill on ExoMars that could allow the ESA rover to dig in the surface up to 12 feet.
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