How does life handle the harshness of space? Experiments on the International Space Station showed that lichens, a combination of algae and fungi, survived in space-like, flight, and Mars-like environments.

June 3, 2020 by Justin Dingman Read More

Strange microbes found living in caves of sulfuric acid Researchers studying a sulfuric acid cave in Italy are among the first to describe organisms found living in gypsum, an acidic mineral deposit found on the cave walls.

May 20, 2020 by Mackenzie Best Read More

A new understanding of weather on Saturn The Cassini spacecraft revealed the atmosphere of Saturn has large regions that don’t cycle to the poles and that the atmosphere is filled with waves that disrupt circulation.

May 15, 2020 by Hunter Dulay Read More

What can sulfur-eating microbes teach us about life in extreme environments? Microbes living in an extreme environment hosted by a rock called serpentinite use a variety of sulfur compounds to gain energy and survive, which has implications for life that might exist elsewhere in our Universe.

May 13, 2020 by Mary Sabuda Read More

More than decomposers: fungi influence the recovery of pollutants in the environment Researchers found a hidden selenium cycle tied to manganese oxide minerals made by common soil fungi.

May 11, 2020 by Mary Sabuda Read More

Which came first, the cysteine or the egg? The amino acid cysteine was thought to be needed to manufacture itself, leading scientists to wonder where the first cysteine molecule came from.

February 13, 2020 by Justin Dingman Read More

DNA evidence allowed biologists to identify a new type of bacteria Taxonomy is the system biologists use to name living things. DNA evidence allows us to see how related living things are to one another, verifying (or changing!) the naming system.

January 20, 2020 by Barbara Park Poage Read More

Microbe lasagna tells us about what life was like billions of years ago Layers of bacteria and rock leave their fingerprints behind by changing the kinds of carbon atoms we might find in the environment.

January 13, 2020 by Zoe Havlena Read More

Bacteria from the Black Sea Have an Unusual Diet A new species of bacterium was discovered that lives off manganese and sulfur instead of oxygen or carbon dioxide

January 9, 2020 by Alex Duff Read More

Contaminants in groundwater can take over 20 years to break down But scientists have a method for removing the contaminants more quickly, using a underground barrier.

January 8, 2020 by Kristen Amodeo Read More