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posted by martyb on Tuesday October 25 2016, @06:43PM   Printer-friendly
from the bacterial-bonanza dept.

One of the most detailed genomic studies of any ecosystem to date has revealed an underground world of stunning microbial diversity, and added dozens of new branches to the tree of life.

The bacterial bonanza comes from scientists who reconstructed the genomes of more than 2,500 microbes from sediment and groundwater samples collected at an aquifer in Colorado. The effort was led by researchers from the Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and UC Berkeley. DNA sequencing was performed at the Joint Genome Institute, a DOE Office of Science User Facility.

As reported online October 24 in the journal Nature Communications, the scientists netted genomes from 80 percent of all known bacterial phyla, a remarkable degree of biological diversity at one location. They also discovered 47 new phylum-level bacterial groups, naming many of them after influential microbiologists and other scientists. And they learned new insights about how microbial communities work together to drive processes that are critical to the planet's climate and life everywhere, such as the carbon and nitrogen cycles.

The team responsible has single-handedly doubled the number of known bacterial groups.


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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday October 25 2016, @10:08PM

    by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Tuesday October 25 2016, @10:08PM (#418751) Homepage Journal

    I'd like to post my sequence on my website for the benefit of medical researchers.

    I can do all kinds of things that people with Schizoaffective Disorder are not supposed to be able to do. For example, when first informed I was having auditory hallucinations, I made them stop after two days of puzzling over the differences between my hallucinations and real human voices. The hallucinations seemed more real; I always have some doubt as to my real perceptions.

    --
    Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @10:30PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @10:30PM (#418756)

    It took him decades, but Nash (of the Nash equilibrium) learned to ignore the voices.

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Taibhsear on Wednesday October 26 2016, @06:26PM

    by Taibhsear (1464) on Wednesday October 26 2016, @06:26PM (#419082)

    I haven't done so myself yet but a few friends of mine went to "23 and Me." Looks like it might not be the full sequencing but rather genotyping.

    https://www.23andme.com/ [23andme.com]