Can humans and animals survive without oxygen?

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Yellowstone National Park's hot springs can be harsh environments, but they are also home to many bacteria that can shed light on the evolutionary origin of life on Earth and perhaps what lurks on. distant planets. Let's TipsMake.com find out if people and animals can survive without oxygen or not!

Evening Primrose hot spring in Yellowstone National Park.Photo source: Dan Colman

While photosynthetic life cannot withstand the high temperatures of hot springs, the microorganisms are chemical - that is, they only rely on chemicals, not sunlight, as sources. their energy. Many of these special bacteria are thought to be the closest to the earliest growing life on our planet Earth.

" Synthetic chemical microorganisms provide useful models to understand how life can exist in extraterrestrial ecosystems, such as the underside of Europa (sixth satellite, in orbit from inside to outside, of Jupiter), where light energy is not available, but may have a rich source of chemical energy, " Daniel Colman , a geologist at the University of Montana in Bozeman said.

In 2014, Colman and his colleagues collected samples from chemical microbial communities in 15 hot springs in Yellowstone National Park. Hot springs are complex environments where there are many different nutrients, even in the same hot spring. Colman analyzed these changes that could form the types of chemical communities that exist in any position.

Colman and his research team detailed their findings in the " Ecological Differentiation in Planktonic and Sediment-associated chemotrophic microbial populations in Yellowstone Hot Springs " article. zooplankton and sedimentary chemical microbial populations in Yellowstone hot spring ") are published in the journal FEMS Microbiology Ecology .

Lake Cinder in Yellowstone National Park.Photo source: Dan Colman

Scientific researchers have observed microorganisms, or planktonic, to swim freely, or microorganisms that live in sediments , and then test the chemistry of water and minerals. objects in sediments.

They focus on studying substances called oxidants , which help organisms absorb energy by separating electrons from nutrients. While humans and many other organisms live on oxygen to act as their primary oxidizing agent, chemotherapy bacteria rely on other oxidants, providing less energy, such as iron forms. and sulfur is oxidized ( oxidized material is electronically lost ).

Scientists have discovered that plankton communities in Yellowstone National Park are dominated by microelements, which need oxygen to survive but at lower concentrations present in pots. Earth's atmosphere. On the other hand, the sedimentary communities in Yellowstone are also dominated by chemotherapy bacteria that rely on inorganic substances such as sulfur or iron to oxidize as their oxidizing agent.

These findings shed light on how and why bacteria in hot spring sediments differ from those in the water. Microorganisms living in water and exposed to air can use oxygen from the air as their oxidizing agent, while bacteria that live in sediments that are poorly oxidized need substances Other oxidation. Researchers hope that early life on Earth is limited by the availability of oxidants and what to do with the things around them. It may resemble life elsewhere in the cosmic planet.

Steep Cone in Yellowstone National Park.Photo source: Dan Colman

" Understanding the current distribution of microorganisms when it comes to environmental factors can provide an idea of ​​how life has evolved in the reaction to changing the environment around history. land and the evolutionary history of life, "Colman said.

Colman is particularly interested in undersea microbial communities in Yellowstone National Park, because in some ways, it may resemble extraterrestrial environments like Europa. Nothing is known about nature, or even the existence of a high temperature terrestrial biosphere in Yellowstone National Park, because it is not allowed to drill oil on national park land.

NASA paid attention to this study because the understanding of life in Yellowstone National Park's hot springs has the potential to shed light on life that can thrive in extraterrestrial environments, that temperature and pressure also as low nutrients.

Colman added: " These environments are not available in cosmological research, but can still be found on Enceladus (a small moon of Saturn), Mars or Europa (sixth satellite, calculated by fund religion from inside to outside of Jupiter) ".

For example, like the hot spring deposits in Yellowstone with low oxygen levels, " we expect that life in the underground environments of other planets will be hampered by chronic oxidative deficiencies. like oxygen, and know what to do with oxidants that provide less energy , "Colman said.

See also: Science test: Potatoes can be grown on Mars

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