5 Microbes That Live Places That Would Kill Anyone Else
Microbes get a pretty bad rap. For most people, they’ve got a reputation as tiny little creepy-crawlies. Something we’d rather not get on us or in us, despite the fact that we’re all carrying around about as many microbes as we are human cells.
Sure, there are some unsavory characters in their little world, the ones that live on Chipotle lettuce and wreck your stomach or get in a cut and shut you down from the inside out. But there’s just as many helpful ones, and ones that are just straight-up cool. Specifically, extremophiles, which are microbes adapted for extreme environments and can live in the most inhospitable places on earth.
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Here are five types of microbes that thrive where nothing else can…
Thermophiles
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As you might be able to guess from the name and the big red picture of a thermometer, thermophiles are micro-organisms uniquely suited to extreme heat. We’re not talking a bit of a spicy day either, but temperatures that make a car seatbelt in summer seem soothing. Yet even among thermophiles, there’s another group that takes it to the next level, known as hyperthermophiles. For example, Methanopyrus kandleri is a microbe that not only survives but reproduces at over 250 degrees Fahrenheit.
Cryophiles
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The opposite of thermophiles are cryophiles, which I like to think, despite knowing this isn’t at all how things work, are bitter rivals of the thermophiles. Just imagine, two squads of microbes fighting over the global thermostat like they’re in a bitter marriage. Delightful.
Cryophiles have a comparatively low temperature at which they’re happy to keep multiplying: roughly 3 degrees Fahrenheit. Below that, they may take a break from making babies, but they’re still able to survive and remain active. In fact, they’re more than fine on the wrong end of zero, down to negative 13 degrees Fahrenheit.
Acidophiles
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Hot and cold temperatures are inhospitable, sure, but they feel a little pedestrian. After all, it’s not like animals haven’t evolved the same way, just to a lesser extent. The environment of the straightforwardly named acidophiles? Not something anybody is eager to touch, much less immerse themselves in.
These microorganisms live happy lives in extremely acidic environments. Case in point: Picrophilus. The pH scale measures acidity, running from zero (most acidic) to 14 (most basic). Water is smack-dab in the middle, at a pH of 7. Straight up lemon juice clocks in at a pH of 2. Picrophilus is fine growing in a pH of full-on zero. As in, reproducing in pure hydrochloric acid. Their ideal pH is 0.7, meaning sulfuric acid feels a little too gentle for them.
Barophiles
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The dangers of high-pressure environments are generally underappreciated by the layman. It doesn’t seem like diving a little too deep in the ocean would lead to anything too gruesome. Then, you see a certain episode of MythBusters where a bunch of pig parts juice themselves inside a diving suit like a bloody Magic Bullet — a fate that barophiles, microorganisms that live at extreme pressures far below sea level, don’t ever have to worry about.
Quite the opposite actually: Obligate barophiles are built for these pressures, and can’t survive outside of them. Not that microbes like Halomonas salaria are at risk of anyone pushing them out of their preferred 1,000 atm homes. For comparison, the Titan submersible that imploded on its way to Titanic happened at roughly 375 atm.
Radio-Resistant Organisms
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We’ve saved the best for last, the ones that, if all goes wrong, are going to stick around on this earth after we’re all gone. They don’t have a catchy “phile” name, but are simply known as radio-resistant organisms. Their happy place? Extreme radiation. Like Deinococcus radiodurans, a bacteria whose taste for radiation has led to them being dubbed the “doomsday bacteria.”
Just how radiation resistant are they? Using a measure of radiation known as grays, which equal 100 rads, a human would die at 5 grays. Hit these dudes with 5,000 grays, and they’re just fine. Go up to 15,000 grays, and they’re not all making it, but they're not all dying, either.
If there’s ever an “Oops! All Chernobyls” occurrence, they’ll be wondering where the hell everybody went.
