ABOVE: Oases scattered around the Cuatro Ciénegas Basin in Northern Mexico are home to ancient microbial life.
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS, CAZADORDEMOLINOS
Deep within Northern Mexico’s Chihuahuan Desert lies the Cuatro Ciénegas Basin, a butterfly-shape valley where small turquoise lagoons dot the landscape. These hidden oases possess conditions remarkably similar to those of the planet’s prehistoric past and house many organisms, including fish, diatoms, and bacteria, that cannot be found anywhere else on Earth. The aquatic system is also one of the few places where stromatolites—rock- or reeflike structures, built up by microbes, that once dominated the shores of ancient oceans—still live and grow, their surfaces made up of active microbial colonies.
The unusual features of the Cuatro Ciénegas Basin and its inhabitants have drawn many scientists to the area since it was first encountered by biologists in the late 1930s. Valeria Souza, a microbiologist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, was ...
