Geothermal ecosystems, such as volcanoes and hot terrestrial and deep-sea springs, are characterized by severe conditions. The temperatures are high and.
Credit: Vitaly Kadnikov
Geothermal ecosystems, such as volcanoes and hot terrestrial and deep-sea springs, are characterized by severe conditions. The temperatures are high and the environment could be extremely acidic or very alkaline. Moreover, there are chemically active compounds in them that can be fatal to living organisms, because they are capable of destroying the membrane of an ordinary cell. Exclusively very adapted microorganisms can exist here. They do not only have unique protective systems but are also able to get energy from chemical transformations of those substances that are available to them. Humans are actively using the peculiarities of their metabolism, for example some enzymes help biologists to amplify DNA molecules in a test tube, says Vitaly Kadnikov, Ph.D., senior researcher at the Federal Research Centre Fundamentals of Biotechnology of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the principal investigator of the grant from the Russian Science Foundation.