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This Tiny Microbe Can Withstand Extreme Radiation That Would Obliterate Humans. Here's How It Might Protect Astronauts on a Trip to Mars

Could a humble bacterium hold the key to surviving cosmic radiation?

Sturdy virus might help us treat infectious diseases

Scientists are studying a virus that survives in extremely hot environments in the hope that it will give us better ways of fighting infectious diseases.

Tardigrades - the microscopic water bears that defy all odds

They’re small and cute, and while indeed these creatures are completely harmless, make no mistake – these are some tough ‘gummy bears’. Called tardigrades or water bears, these eight-legged invertebrates have evolved to survive in some of the most extreme environments on Earth. Rightfully so, they’ve been classed by scientists as extremophiles – creatures that are […]

Canadian Arctic bacterium offers clues to life on Mars

A team of Canadian researchers has discovered a bacterium that thrives in the Arctic regions, much below freezing point, at -15 degrees C in one the coldest temperature ever reported for bacterial growth. The discovery of the bacterium Planococcus halocryophilus OR1 was made in Ellesmere Island, Canada, a part of the Canadian territory of Nunavut, […]

Deepest ocean "teems with microbes"

The Mariana trench is the deepest point on Earth; now, an international team of researchers found that the very bottom of the Mariana Trench, which lies almost 11 km beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean, has high levels of microbial activity. No more than 30 years ago, we had a very different idea about […]

Bacteria lives at extreme gravitational forces

We already know about numerous extremophiles, microbes that can live in incredibly extreme conditions, which would easily kill almost every other creature. There are bacteria which survive in extremely high or low temperatures, in substances with an extreme pH, surrounded by nothing but solid rock, in the depths of the ocean, and so on. But […]