Now that creates some interesting questions, doesn’t it?
The microbe Metallosphaera sedula is known to have a penchant for eating minerals. We’re not talking about garden-variety granite or chalk, though. This particular mineral connoisseur loves to dine on far more exotic rocks – ones that come from space.
The discovery of the bacteria-like archaeon’s preference for meteorites not only invites speculation on how terrestrial life could survive off world, it offers insight into how early biology could have received key nutrients through space rocks that landed on Earth way back when…
While we gaze into the heavens in hope of finding life that isn’t from here, it’s becoming clear that microbes that evolved on Earth might already have beat us into space.
Mike McRae, “Scientists Just Identified an Organism That Thrives on Eating Meteorites” at ScienceAlerts
Well, they might also have come from space too, right?
Paper. (open access)
See also: The Science Fictions series at your fingertips – origin of life What we do and don’t know about the origin of life.
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