Life depends on Earth on the surrounding bacteria networks

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Prochlorococcus The bacteria are so small that you had to line up around a thousand of them to suit the thickness of the human mini image. The ocean prevails with them: may be microbes The most abundant The optical acting object on the planet, and they create a large part – 10 percent to 20 percent – of oxygen in the air. This means that life on Earth depends on approximately 3 oranges (or 3 x 10²⁷) Small individual cells grow away.

Biologists have once thought about these beings as isolated isolated isolation, and they wander around an indelible breadth. but Prochlorococcus Population may be more closely than anyone could imagine. They may have conversations over wide distances, not only filling the ocean with an envelope of information and nutrients, but also link what we thought was their own interiors with the interiors of other cells.

At the University of Córdoba in Spain, not long ago, biologists saw pictures of blue bacteria under a microscope, he saw a cell that grew a long, delicate tube and bored with his neighbor. The picture made them sit. They got out that this was not a coincidence.

“We realized that the blue bacteria were linked to each other,” he said, “He said,” Maria del Carmen Monoz MarkenThe world of microbiology there. There were links between Prochlorococcus Cells, as well as with other bacteria, are called Synechococcus, Who lives often nearby. In the pictures, the silver bridges connect three or four and sometimes 10 cells or more.

Muñoz-aarín had a intuition about the identity of these mysterious structures. After a battery of tests, she and her colleagues I mentioned recently These bridges are bacterial nanopolines. It was first observed in a joint laboratory bacteria just 14 years ago, bacterial nano tubes are structures made of cell membrane that allows food and resources to flow between or more cells.

The structures were Source of magic and controversy Over the past decade, where microbiologists have worked to understand what causes them to form and exactly travel between these networks connected to the network. The photos were distinguished from the MUñOZ-MARíN laboratory the first time that these structures were seen in the blue bacteria responsible for a lot of light representation of the Earth.

They challenge the basic ideas about bacteria, and ask questions such as: How much does it do Prochlorococcus Share with the surrounding cells? Is it really logical to think about it, and other bacteria, such as one cell?

Tubular

Many bacteria for them An active social life. Some make a growth of the protein that connects Pelay, and connects them with cells to allow them to exchange DNA. Some dense paintings are formed together, known as Vital. And many emissions Small bubbles known as vesicles That contains DNA, RNA or other chemicals, such as messages in a bottle of any cell that occurs to intercede.

They are the vesicles that Muñoz-Mañoz-MARíN and Kouliara, including José Manuel García-Fernandez, are a microscopic at Córdoba University, and a student student. Elisa AnnovasThey were looking for their enlargement Prochlorococcus and Synechococcus In a plate. When they saw what they were suspected, the nanotechnology was a surprise.