ANDRZEJ KRAUZEWhat would happen in a world without microbes?” ask researchers Jack Gilbert and Josh Neufeld in a December thought-experiment article in PLOS Biology. After considering the intricate interdependencies that exist among our planet’s life forms, the authors conclude that “although life would persist in the absence of microbes, both the quantity and quality of life would be reduced drastically.” To this I would like to add that life-science studies would be a lot more boring. And the feature well of this issue would be empty.
The microbial ancestors from which complex life evolved faced challenging environmental conditions, and their extant relatives continue to astonish with their ability to withstand temperatures, pressures, and radiation doses that would do in any human. So wide-ranging are the adaptations of these so-called extremophiles that they inform the search for life on other planets. That’s why a two-month-long burst of methane on Mars, announced at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union (coincidentally, the same day the PLOS Biology article ran), generated such excitement. The methane spike could have been the result of a geologic process, of course, but what if it signaled the presence of microbes in residence beneath the Martian surface?
In a world without microbes, life-science studies would be a lot ...
