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(www.neomundo.com.ar/_SINC) the driest desert on Earth bulle life. A hispano-chileno team of scientists has discovered bacteria and Archaea (primitive organisms) living at 2 meters deep in the Atacama desert, in Chile, hypersaline substrates according to published in the journal Astrobiology.

“What we have called ’microbial oasis’ because we are micro-organisms in a Habitat rich in halite (salt) and other compounds (anhydrite and perchlorate) highly hygroscopic, i.e., trapping water”, explains Victor Parro, researcher at the Center for Astrobiology (INTA-CSIC) and coordinator of the study.

In addition, substrates where they live microbes also favor phenomena of nerfs, implying that they can attract the little moisture in the air and to focus around the salt crystals. Thus form a tiny films of liquid water with a thickness of a few microns.

Water and food in the desert

Grow underground microbes with everything they need to live in this environment: water and food. Species are not very different from other similar hypersaline environments, but the peculiar is having discovered to between 2 and 3 meters depth, in the absence of oxygen and sunlight.

To do research scientists have used an instrument called SOLID (Signs of LIfe Detector), a detector of signs of life developed by the team with the aim of being able to use in future missions to Mars.

The DETECTOR is SOLID

The heart of SOLID is a biochip – called LDChip-incorporating up to 450 antibodies to identify biological sugars, proteins and DNA material. Automatically you can take samples, incubate them, process them and see the results in an image with bright spots that betray the presence of certain compounds or microorganisms.

With this technique researchers have in situ confirmed the presence of bacteria and Archaea underground desert, in collaboration with scientists from the Catholic University of the North in Chile. They also took samples at a depth of up to 5 m and led to the laboratory. There they managed to not only photograph to microorganisms with the electron microscope, that “they woke” to life when they were provided with water.

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