Lukas VFN 🇪🇺The parasitic lifestyle of an archaeal symbiont https://phys.org/news/2024-08-ancient-antarctic-microorganisms-aggressive-predators.html https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-49962-y
The #archaea used in the study were collected from the cold and hypersaline Deep Lake in #Antarctica... #DPANN archaea are much smaller than other archaea, with very small genomes and limited metabolic capabilities... they depend on host #microbes to survive... This is the first time such aggressive behavior has been observed in archaea.
Ancient Antarctic microorganisms are aggressive predators
In Antarctica there is a small lake, called Deep Lake, that is so salty it remains ice-free all year round despite temperatures as low as -20°C in winter. Archaea, a unique type of single-celled microorganism, thrive in this bitterly cold environment.
Sam