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from the clam-jokes-just-write-themselves dept.
Chlamydia-related bacteria discovered deep below the Arctic Ocean:
Chlamydia are infamous for causing sexually transmitted infections in humans and animals or even amoeba. An international team of researchers have now discovered diverse populations of abundant Chlamydia living in deep Arctic ocean sediments. They live under oxygen-devoid conditions, high pressure and without an apparent host organism. Their study, published in Current Biology today, provides new insights into how Chlamydia became human and animal pathogens.
[...] An international group of researchers report the discovery of numerous new species of Chlamydiae growing in deep Arctic Ocean sediments, in absence of any obvious host organisms. The researchers had been exploring microbes that live over 3 km below the ocean surface and several meters into the ocean seafloor sediment during an expedition to Loki's Castle, a deep-sea hydrothermal vent field located in the Arctic Ocean in-between Iceland, Norway, and Svalbard. This environment is devoid of oxygen and macroscopic life forms. Unexpectedly, the research team came across highly abundant and diverse relatives of Chlamydia. "Finding Chlamydiae in this environment was completely unexpected, and of course begged the question what on earth were they doing there?" says Jennah Dharamshi from Uppsala University in Sweden and lead author of the study.
The team of researchers had been working with metagenomic data—obtained by collectively sequencing the genetic material of all organisms that live in an environment—which doesn't rely on growing organisms in the lab. "The vast majority of life on earth is microbial, and currently most of it can't be grown in the lab," explains Thijs Ettema, professor in Microbiology at Wageningen University & Research in The Netherlands who led the work. "By using genomic methods, we obtained a more clear image on the diversity of life. Every time we explore a different environment, we discover groups of microbes that are new to science. This tells us just how much is still left to discover."
Journal Information:
Jennah E. Dharamshi, Daniel Tamarit,
Laura Eme, ..., Steffen L. Jørgensen,
Anja Spang, Thijs J.G. Ettema.
Marine Sediments Illuminate Chlamydiae Diversity and Evolution
Current Biology (2020)
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday March 09 2020, @08:45PM (3 children)
Rather than asking how a diverse related species got into the ocean (eg "there"), we should ask how one strain of it got onto land and host organisms that facilitate its success.
In other words, "what are they doing there" is maybe the wrong question. Maybe that is where they live. As TFA says: diverse relatives. Maybe ask how the non-diverse kind we are more familiar with somehow got here.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Monday March 09 2020, @09:26PM (2 children)
You are what you eat? Fish, or....fish taco maybe? ;)
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday March 09 2020, @09:36PM (1 child)
3 km deep, and then several meters below the sea floor? Doesn't sound like fishing to me.
Nevertheless I don't like seafood. The closest I would dare get is fish sticks (yuk) or "long john silver's" if that even still exists.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Monday March 09 2020, @09:59PM
When I was a kid, my friend and I would catch perch off the dock: he'd scale and clean them (he was much faster than me ) and we'd have them for breakfast....fecking AMAZING!
Now I wants some...perch OR catfish....
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---