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Scientists Discover Organism that hasn't Evolved in More Than 2 Billion Years

posted by martyb on Tuesday February 03 2015, @04:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the same-old-same-old dept.

AnonTechie writes:

An international team of scientists has discovered the greatest absence of evolution ever reported—a type of deep-sea microorganism that appears not to have evolved over more than 2 billion years. But the researchers say that the organisms' lack of evolution actually supports Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. The findings are published online today by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The scientists examined sulfur bacteria, microorganisms that are too small to see with the unaided eye, that are 1.8 billion years old and were preserved in rocks from Western Australia's coastal waters. Using cutting-edge technology, they found that the bacteria look the same as bacteria of the same region from 2.3 billion years ago—and that both sets of ancient bacteria are indistinguishable from modern sulfur bacteria found in mud off of the coast of Chile.

http://phys.org/news/2015-02-scientists-hasnt-evolved-billion-years.html

[Abstract]: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2015/01/27/1419241112

 
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  • (Score: 1) by Arik on Tuesday February 03 2015, @09:35PM

    by Arik (4543) on Tuesday February 03 2015, @09:35PM (#140859) Journal
    "However, the scientists are proposing that the environmental changes are negligible for such creatures, whereas our environment has changed quite a lot in the same timeframe."

    You realize they live on the same planet we do, right?
    --
    If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?

  • (Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Wednesday February 04 2015, @08:25AM

    by wonkey_monkey (279) on Wednesday February 04 2015, @08:25AM (#141044) Homepage

    You realise our planet has many widely varying environments, right? Why don't you move to the Arctic, the bottom of the Mariana Trench, or the middle of Death Valley? It's the same planet.

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk

  • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday February 04 2015, @10:48AM

    by FatPhil (863) <reversethis-{if.fdsa} {ta} {tnelyos-cp}> on Wednesday February 04 2015, @10:48AM (#141085) Homepage
    I had briefly forgotten that, thanks for reminding me. It was rather foolish of me to enter a scientific argument not armed with that fact. I was also unaware that the entire planet has a uniform environment on the land and in the hydrosphere. It's amazing what you learn on the internet!

    SN site perl coders - is the <sarcasm> tag supposed to work, as, according to 'preview', it doesn't.
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