Microbes that eat and breathe electricity discovered.

a reply to: watchitburn

All the textbooks say it shouldn't be possible,” he says,

I wish more people would remember sentence this as it has been said numerous times when science discovers new things that were always right here.

originally posted by: Tardacus
They need electricity to survive so they weren`t on earth 200 years ago when we had no electricity,so how did they get here?

When you hear "electricity", you think a wall socket. What these bacteria go after is metal. OIL RIG is your friend.

That's really cool. Wasn't the U.S.S. Enterprise powered by some kind of microbe like that? I seem to recall an episode where they showed it. Anywho, I can see them using microbes for power before too long. Sci-fi often becomes real life; although, I'm still waiting for my flying car.

Wow.

Other studies had revealed that bacteria sometimes produce hairlike appendages of unknown function. Some researchers dismissed those growths as unimportant, but a few wondered whether the hairs were actually “nanowires” created by the bacteria to move electrons.

To El-Naggar, that reasoning seemed too tidy: “I kind of went into it thinking, it can’t really work that way, right? I’m going to do the measurements that show it doesn’t.” So El-Naggar did what any good home handyman would. He clipped a couple leads onto the wires to see if they conduct electricity. They do. Then he checked to see if the circuit is live, with current flowing across the wires. It is. Finally, he monitored the wires as they form, recording the cells lighting up with activity once they complete a circuit.

You know, even with the world in such a terrible condition...it's still a pretty cool time to be alive.

Well Well this brings Life from Our Thinking ... in a new perspective ..


I guess Carbon units on Earth has a Different level

I'm Not Surprised

When you have Fungus ( Mold ) Eating Radiation in the Old Chernobyl Reactor ...

I guess just Maybe Life Could Exist as Non Carbon Based.. on Distant Worlds to Other Galaxy's

Just Like the Fictional Lifeform in the Book plus Movie Called Andromeda Strain... a Crystalline Base Life form..

The Andromeda Strain

Further investigation determines that the bizarre deaths were caused by a crystal-structured, extraterrestrial microbe on a meteor that crashed into the satellite, knocking it from orbit. The microbe contains chemical elements required for terrestrial life and appears to have a crystalline structure, but lacks DNA, RNA, proteins, and amino acids, yet it directly transforms matter to energy and vice versa.

en.wikipedia.org...

Thinking Transformers may exist Somewhere Far far Away ! .. and Why the Hell Not.. a Metallic Crystalline based Sentient Being ... Could There Be Sentient Beings that are NON Carbon Based ?

Then you have Claimed Bright Energy Beings in Religion that People Believe like Christianity... That are Considered to be Angels...

I Like this


Because Geobacter metallireducens can eat waste and produce electricity, the bacteria could prove useful in microbial fuel cells.



These microbes indicate an immense and largely alien ecosystem here on Earth.



Shewanella oneidensis MR-1 nanowires are outer membrane and periplasmic extensions of the extracellular electron transport components
www.pnas.org...


Microbial hair -- it's electric: Specialized bacterial filaments shown to conduct electricity
Oct 11, 2010 By Carl Marziali


Read more at: phys.org...




Microbial Hair: It's Electric


USC College professor demonstrates how some bacteria grow electrical hair that lets them link up in big biological circuits. These findings suggest that microbial colonies may survive, communicate and share energy in part through electrically conducting hairs known as bacterial nanowires.
www.youtube.com...

a reply to: watchitburn

Great find!

Neil deGrasse Tyson said it best, "life needs energy, it doesn't care if it comes from the Sun". On the Joe Rogan podcast two years ago he talked about the very thing your article talks about, understanding that life can exist outside of the small box we put it in, ie these new microbes. Once we understand this then the search for life outside of our planet here takes on a whole new journey.

a reply to: Wolfenz

are you insinuating that EU could be the norm....if bacteria work at an electric level why not the rest of the known universe ?

originally posted by: Bedlam

originally posted by: Tardacus
They need electricity to survive so they weren`t on earth 200 years ago when we had no electricity,so how did they get here?

When you hear "electricity", you think a wall socket. What these bacteria go after is metal. OIL RIG is your friend.

Agreed.
Electricity wasn't suddenly discovered or invented 200 years ago for a start.
People were rubbing cats fur with Amber rods for "static electrical fun" 2500 years ago by all accounts.

Based on my basic understanding of material science and electricity I would assume these "buggers", as you've referred to them (great phrase btw) would produce very little waste. What a cool discovery, I wonder if it could have any green energy or health applications. So much is happening in the world of science, I guess time will tell.

If these microbes eat light then it's no longer bizarre to suggest entities exist that feed off our energy and emotions. Perhaps these microbes have something in common with paranormal occurrences.

originally posted by: Mehmet666Heineken
If these microbes eat light then it's no longer bizarre to suggest entities exist that feed off our energy and emotions. Perhaps these microbes have something in common with paranormal occurrences.

Well, they don't eat light. But plant cells do. I'm not sure how that spawns a leap to feeding off your "energy" or "emotions".

First, use of the term "energy" there isn't a physics term, it's a new age term. Though it's spelled like the "energy" used in physics, it means something different in that use. Something non-existent.

Unless your putative microbe is living off of your body heat. That would be sparse fare, indeed.

originally posted by: Jukiodone

originally posted by: Bedlam

originally posted by: Tardacus
They need electricity to survive so they weren`t on earth 200 years ago when we had no electricity,so how did they get here?

When you hear "electricity", you think a wall socket. What these bacteria go after is metal. OIL RIG is your friend.

Agreed.
Electricity wasn't suddenly discovered or invented 200 years ago for a start.
People were rubbing cats fur with Amber rods for "static electrical fun" 2500 years ago by all accounts.

And oxidation-reduction reactions were shuttling electrons around for billions of years before that. Note that in the article they were going after magnesium in the water. That would be why. Not to eat it, but to snag electrons from it.

Interesting. But we need to remember that lots of animals, well, any animal with neurons also work on electricity. You can view the neuron as an electric wire, but the flow of electricity is not by electrons, but by ions. Maybe some of those strange neurological diseases for which they cant find any organic cause, can be caused by an infection of these type of bacteria.
I have great interest in this, because of my own medical condition, in which every now and then, my neurons stops talking to my muscles for a time. Neurologists are scratching their heads, as they cannot understanf what is going on. For 6 months I was functionally blind, because my eyelids refused to open. I overcame that by designing a electronic gadget that stimulated my brain, allowing me to open my eyes. Now the same thing is starting to affect my breathing, and my trips to the ER are becoming more and more frequent...
An infection of this kind of bacteria might explain things....

originally posted by: Hellhound604
Interesting. But we need to remember that lots of animals, well, any animal with neurons also work on electricity. You can view the neuron as an electric wire, but the flow of electricity is not by electrons, but by ions.

And those ions don't flow down the neuron, but go back and forth through the membrane at right angles. So it's not like electricity at all.

originally posted by: Bedlam

originally posted by: Hellhound604
Interesting. But we need to remember that lots of animals, well, any animal with neurons also work on electricity. You can view the neuron as an electric wire, but the flow of electricity is not by electrons, but by ions.

And those ions don't flow down the neuron, but go back and forth through the membrane at right angles. So it's not like electricity at all.

Yet we can meausre it by means of normal electronics, EEG, EKG, EMG. We can stimulate the neurons and muscles by electicity (pacemakers, nerve stimulators, TENS, etc.)
So if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is a duck, wouldnt you say?
Galvani still spoke of 'animal electricity', but electricity is electricty, doesnt matter if it is caused by the flow od ions through membranes, or by electrons. It is a flow of a voltage potential

originally posted by: Hellhound604
Yet we can meausre it by means of normal electronics, EEG, EKG, EMG. We can stimulate the neurons and muscles by electicity (pacemakers, nerve stimulators, TENS, etc.)

The electrochemical cascade that is a firing neuron creates a potential difference you can see externally, yes. But it's not a current flow at all. Shooting a pistol makes a sound. But the sound isn't the reason the bullet comes out. You shouldn't confuse side-effects with the primary function.

You can indeed also stimulate muscles and nerves with electricity. But that's not how a nerve does the job. I can open a door with a prybar, but calling it a key is inaccurate. BTW, can you tell me why you can stimulate nerves and muscles with an electric current? Why does that work? Hint - it's not because nerves apply electricity to other nerves and muscles...

So if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it is a duck, wouldnt you say?

I wouldn't, because I know to look for the key sticking out of the putative duck's back. Understanding what a duck is, is the key. eta: if it's no different than electricity, why is nerve conduction so very very slow compared to current flow? Nerves top out at about 100 meters per second, while electricity in a circuit propagates at something close to the speed of light. Hmm. Big difference. Maybe...it's because nerves don't conduct electricity! They ripple a wave of depolarization down a membrane by opening and closing ion channels. And it takes a while to do. And when you get to the end, the wave of depolarization stimulates the release of chemicals from the synaptic membrane, and THAT's what conveys the stimulation to the next nerve or muscle cell. Hm. Ya think?

It is a flow of a voltage potential

See if you can spot what's very wrong in these eight words...

originally posted by: hopenotfeariswhatweneed
a reply to: Wolfenz

are you insinuating that EU could be the norm....if bacteria work at an electric level why not the rest of the known universe ?

Why Not as it looks Life Doesn't Really need The Sun... What Most people think is Life Just can be ONLY Carbon Based ... What Does Planets Have a Magnetic Filed Electrical Discharges , Static Electricity Etc... When a Life Form Can Live Of from .. One Kind of Energy alone Energy Alone it all has to do with a Conversion think of a Plant it Sources a Flora that Converts Particular Energy .for Food Intake from the SUN now we have bacteria that Converts Electricity for it Own Use and Discharge it Energy in a Net work Structure to others of its own Kind plus Communication Communication.... We are basically the Same We Break Down Molecules that Convert Energy (food Intake ) to Electricity and Chemically ... This Bacteria Skips that Process and goes Direct to Electricity... It Interesting about the Bacteria Electro Hairs aka Tentacles that Stretch out out of Nothing to Connect to a Source of Electricity or Other like them Selves... with this Discovery BIO Computers here We COME !!! but Personally... I think Michael Crichton Had the Same Thought that life Could Exist NON Carbon based... Even Sentient ... Then Again we coming Close to a Self Thinking Android Like ASIMO ... HONDA Taking the baby Steps ... Hell... Humans even Created a Self Replication Synthetic Cell.. Most People Forget that.. and Now We Humans (IBM) can Control Manipulate Direct Atoms in its Level ... as a One or a zero.. (12 Atoms) in a Program Language people forget that too.. We are getting Closer to a Level Type 1 Civilization...

originally posted by: zazzafrazz
Whats that show where the electricity gets turned off because the organisms eat the electricity….

You are thinking of the show, Revolution. Which despite it's incredible popularity was cancelled. I for one was seriously bummed...I'm a sucker for a post apocalyptic show and this one was a good one.

Oh, and epic thread here, gave it SnF for sure. Crazy how little we know about....everything.

There was a pretty big thread about this in July, here.

If anyone is looking for some more sources of information: The link from that thread's op is from ExtremeTech and there's an interesting article in 2013 at Astrobiology Magazine