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Ancient lithotroph bacteria M. sedula likes to eat meteorites
Lithotroph, life that uses inorganic food sources
This ancient bacteria, Metallosphaera sedula, eats rocks and colonizes faster on processed meteorite than earthly rock. The article doesn't specify what earthly means or how many different types of earth rocks were sampled.
It could be coincidence that processed meteorite supplied all the metallic nutrients needed for faster growth versus what earth rocks offer or that bacteria has seen that mixture before. It could be from a lot meteorites bombarding the Earth billions of years ago or the early Earth surface was more metallic than it is today.
If life started out by not eating organic material, which seems highly likely, and morphed over to what we are familiar with today, perhaps it is far more easier for life to start up anywhere in the universe than normally suspected. Metal is probably is a more stable nutrient in the universe at large when the time table for coordinating conditions, diet, and body could be a window billions of years wide open. Who knows, maybe organic life is the exception and most life is metal based. I would think if that was the case, organic life would have the most variety because of how fragile it is.
Lithotroph, life that uses inorganic food sources
This ancient bacteria, Metallosphaera sedula, eats rocks and colonizes faster on processed meteorite than earthly rock. The article doesn't specify what earthly means or how many different types of earth rocks were sampled.
It could be coincidence that processed meteorite supplied all the metallic nutrients needed for faster growth versus what earth rocks offer or that bacteria has seen that mixture before. It could be from a lot meteorites bombarding the Earth billions of years ago or the early Earth surface was more metallic than it is today.
If life started out by not eating organic material, which seems highly likely, and morphed over to what we are familiar with today, perhaps it is far more easier for life to start up anywhere in the universe than normally suspected. Metal is probably is a more stable nutrient in the universe at large when the time table for coordinating conditions, diet, and body could be a window billions of years wide open. Who knows, maybe organic life is the exception and most life is metal based. I would think if that was the case, organic life would have the most variety because of how fragile it is.
