evolution Archives

Left panel: all prophage encoded proteins in each species. Right panel: the subset of prophage-encoded proteins that confer a unique function to their host. *Conservation score: mean of the functionally unique protein count divided by the total prophage protein count for each functional category. Phage-related proteins and uncharacterized/hypothetical proteins were excluded from the figure. -- NASA via Nature communications

Genomics, Proteomics, Bioinformatics, Microbiology & Virology, Microgravity, Space Life Science, Space Stations, Status Report

Microbial Adaptation To Spaceflight Is Correlated With Bacteriophage-encoded Functions

by Keith CowingMay 16, 2024May 16, 2024

Evidence from the International Space Station suggests microbial populations are rapidly adapting to the spacecraft environment; however, the mechanism of this adaptation is not understood. Bacteriophages are prolific mediators of […]

A plume of gas and ice grains emanates from the South Polar Terrain on Enceladus. The plume source is a global ocean of liquid water beneath the moon's icy crust. Plume materials erupt as diffuse “curtains” of water vapor punctured by ∼100 localized “jets” of gas and ice grains primarily 0.1–10 μm in size (Porco et al., 2006; Spitale et al., 2015). Small ice grains escape Enceladus' gravity and populate Saturn's E-ring, but larger, slower grains are ejected to an altitude of 30–50 km and then fall back (Goldstein et al., 2018). Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute.

Astrochemistry, Astrogeology, Biochemistry & Organic Chemistry, Biogeochemical Cycles & Geobiology, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Enceladus, Habitable Zones, Icy Worlds, Status Report, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography

Enceladus: Astrobiology Revisited

by Keith CowingMay 14, 2024May 14, 2024

Astrobiology research seeks to understand how life begins and evolves, and to determine whether life exist elsewhere in the universe. The discovery of diverse ocean worlds has significantly expanded the […]

Astrobiology (general), Atmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biogeochemical Cycles & Geobiology, Gaia - Planetary Perspectives, Origin & Evolution of Life, Status Report

What Doesn’t Kill Gaia Makes Her Stronger

by Keith CowingMay 10, 2024May 10, 2024

Life on Earth has experienced numerous upheavals over its approximately 4 billion year history. In previous work we have discussed how interruptions to stability lead, on average, to increases in […]

Hexose sugar permeability through archaeal and hybrid membranes. Temporal dependence of average carboxyfluorescein (CF) fluorescence in the archaea-like G1PC phospholipid membrane (G1PC, filled symbols) and in the ‘hybrid’ phospholipid membrane (G3PC, open symbols) during the exposure to 1 mM of variant substrates delivered to the microfluidic coves. Mean (symbols) and standard deviation (error bars) were calculated from at least 10 single-vesicle measurements across three independent experiments. Data are processed and illustrated as described in Figure 1 legend. N is the number of single vesicles investigated for each substrate exposure and each type of vesicles. **: p-value < 0.01. Numerical values of CF fluorescence in individual vesicles for each lipid type during the delivery of each substrate are provided in S1 File and S2 File. -- biorxiv.org

Biochemistry & Organic Chemistry, Biophysics, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Genomics, Proteomics, Bioinformatics, Origin & Evolution of Life, Status Report

Membrane Permeability Selection Drove the Stereochemistry of Life

by Keith CowingMay 9, 2024September 18, 2025

Early in the evolution of life a proto-metabolic network was encapsulated within a membrane compartment. The permeability characteristics of the membrane determined several key functions of this network by determining […]

This illustration shows magnetic field lines that Earth generates today. The Moon no longer has a magnetic field. -- NASA

Atmospheres, Climate, Weather, Biochemistry & Organic Chemistry, Biophysics, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Fossils & Paleontology, Habitable Zones, Magnetic Fields, Electromagnetism, bioelectricity,, Press Release, Water/Hycean Worlds & Oceanography

A Weak Magnetic Field May Have Supported The Diversification Of Life On Earth

by Keith CowingMay 3, 2024May 3, 2024

An unusual reduction in the strength of the Earth’s magnetic field between 591 and 565 million years ago coincided with a significant increase in the oxygen levels in the atmosphere […]

a, Heatmap of 45 conserved microexon-tags predicted by MEPmodeler. Microexon rate is the rate of true microexons among all predicted results in the cluster. For example, green cells indicate that 100% microexons with two flanking introns are present, orange indicates all microexon sequences are parts of large exons and none of them could be considered as microexons, and the others are between 0 and 1. A gray cell indicates missing data (a microexon-tag could not be found). The numbers on the right column indicate the predicted clusters containing at least one true microexon (see ref. 80 for more detail). b, RNA-seq evidence of the 1 bp microexon in cluster 2 (x axis the genomic location, and y axis the read count). c, RNA-seq evidence of two adjacent microexons, 5 (cluster 7) and 12 bp (cluster 28). In b and c, the RNA-seq of condition p881sControl2 was used; RNA-seq read depth (blue numbers) and gene annotation are shown; blue arcs indicate introns (exon–exon junctions), and the numbers indicate the junction read counts supporting the introns. The pink arrows point to microexons. d, Exon–intron structures of microexon-tag clusters 7 and 28 in 14 plant genomes. The structure was predicted by relaxing the stringency in M. viride genome and by doing TBLASTX search in S. muscicola genome (all three copies are intronless in this microexon-tag), respectively. The others are predicted with default parameters. -- Nature Genetics

Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Genomics, Proteomics, Bioinformatics, Microbiology & Virology, Origin & Evolution of Life, Plant Biology, Press Release

Revealing The Genomic Code For The Earliest Forms Of Terrestrial Plant Life

by Keith CowingMay 3, 2024

Plant life first emerged on land about 550 million years ago, and an international research team co-led by University of Nebraska–Lincoln computational biologist Yanbin Yin has cracked the genomic code […]

Strelitzia is a genus of five species of perennial plants, native to South Africa. It belongs to the plant family Strelitziaceae. A common name of the genus is bird of paradise flower/plant, because of a resemblance of its flowers to birds-of-paradise. In South Africa, it is commonly known as a crane flower. -- Wikipedia

AI - Data - Apps - Cybernetics, Away Teams & Field Reports, Gaia - Planetary Perspectives, Genomics, Proteomics, Bioinformatics, Mapping, Geodesy, Cartography, Bathymetry, Nomenclature, Systematics, Natural History, Origin & Evolution of Life, Plant Biology, Press Release

Earth Life Biodiversity: Vast DNA Tree Of life For Flowering Plants Revealed

by Keith CowingApril 25, 2024April 25, 2024

The most up-to-date understanding of the flowering plant tree of life is presented in a new study published today in the journal Nature by an international team of 279 scientists, […]

Simulated oxygen (left; a,d,g), sulfate (middle; b,e,h), and methane (right; c,f,i) concentrations in a Proterozoic-like ocean with 10-3 PAL O2. Maps show each species in surface seawater (top; a-c) and benthic seawater (middle; d-f). Also shown are zonal average vertical profiles (bottom; g-i). Oxygen is limited to oxygen oases in surface seawater, leading to extensive SO4 2- reduction and local SO4 2- scarcity at depth, especially underlying productive regions of the surface ocean and in the oldest bottom waters. Where SO4 2- concentrations are low, methanogenesis leads to CH4 accumulation, but CH4 must evade oxidation by both SO4 2- in the ocean interior and O2 in surface waters before it may enter the atmosphere. This figure is reproduced from Reinhard et al. (2020) under Creative Commons Attribution License CCBY. Nitrous oxide (N2O -- astro-ph.EP

Analog Studies, Biochemistry & Organic Chemistry, Biogeochemical Cycles & Geobiology, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Exoplanets, -moons, -comets, Fossils & Paleontology, Gaia - Planetary Perspectives, Habitable Zones, Origin & Evolution of Life, Status Report, Terraforming & Geoengineering

The Early Earth As An Analogue For Exoplanetary Biogeochemistry

by Keith CowingApril 25, 2024April 25, 2024

Planet Earth has evolved from an entirely anoxic planet with possibly a different tectonic regime to the oxygenated world with horizontal plate tectonics that we know today.

LUCA clans inform the origins of the current genetic code, while pre-LUCA clans reflect a still older system. Colored sequences emerged at different stages during the construction of the current genetic code. Grey sequences emerged under some more ancient, unknown, nowextinct coding mechanism(s). By current code, we include not just the canonical code, but also its direct ancestors. -- biorxiv.org

Biochemistry & Organic Chemistry, Biophysics, Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Genomics, Proteomics, Bioinformatics, Origin & Evolution of Life, Status Report

Identifying The Last Universal Common Ancestor’s Protein Domains Resolves The Order In Which The Amino Acids Were Recruited Into The Genetic Code

by Keith CowingApril 23, 2024April 23, 2024

We identified protein domains that emerged early in the history of life. Protein domains whose ancestors date back to a single homolog in the Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA) remain […]

Biosignatures & Paleobiology, Extremeophiles and Extreme Environments, Genomics, Proteomics, Bioinformatics, Microbiology & Virology, Microgravity, Space Life Science, Space Stations, Status Report

Bacteria Found On The International Space Station Are Mutating To Become Functionally Distinct

by Keith CowingApril 20, 2024April 20, 2024

In a new scientific paper funded by an Ames Space Biology grant, Principal Investigator Dr. Kasthuri Venkateswaran of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory strains of the bacterial species Enterobacter bugandensis isolated […]