Evolution: a new twig is added (Evolution)

by David Turell , Thursday, December 08, 2022, 02:48 (506 days ago) @ David Turell

Discovery of new sea organisms, all predatory:

https://phys.org/news/2022-12-tree-life-lions-microbial-world.html

"There's a new branch on the tree of life and it's made up of predators that nibble their prey to death.

"These microbial predators fall into two groups, one of which researchers have dubbed "nibblerids" because they, well, nibble chunks off their prey using tooth-like structures. The other group, nebulids, eat their prey whole. And both constitute a new ancient branch on the tree of life called Provora, according to a paper published today in Nature.

Like lions, cheetahs, and more familiar predators, these microbes are numerically rare but important to the ecosystem, says senior author Dr. Patrick Keeling, professor in the UBC department of botany. "Imagine if you were an alien and sampled the Serengeti: you would get a lot of plants and maybe a gazelle, but no lions. But lions do matter, even if they are rare. These are lions of the microbial world." (my bold)

***

"'In the taxonomy of living organisms, we often use the gene '18S rRNA' to describe genetic difference. For example, humans differ from guinea pigs in this gene by only six nucleotides. We were surprised to find that these predatory microbes differ by 170 to 180 nucleotides in the 18S rRNA gene from every other living thing on Earth. It became clear that we had discovered something completely new and amazing," Dr. Tikhonenkov said.

"On the tree of life, the animal kingdom would be a twig growing from one of the boughs called domains, the highest category of life. But sitting under domains, and above kingdoms, are branches of creatures that biologists have taken to calling supergroups. About five to seven have been found, with the most recent in 2018—until now.

***

"'Ignoring microbial ecosystems, like we often do, is like having a house that needs repair and just redecorating the kitchen, but ignoring the roof or the foundations," said Dr. Keeling. "This is an ancient branch of the tree of life that is roughly as diverse as the animal and fungi kingdoms combined, and no one knew it was there." (my bold)

***

'Culturing the microbial predators was no mean feat, since they require a mini-ecosystem with their food and their food's food just to survive in the lab. (my bold)

"A difficult process in itself, the cultures were initially grown in Canada and Russia, and both COVID and Russia's war with Ukraine prevented Russian scientists from visiting the lab in Canada in recent years, slowing down the collaboration."

Comment: a real surprise. There are ecosystems everywhere, all built the same way. All depending on dog-eat-dog. And dhw calls our own important ecosystem as a superficial entitry: "human plus food" and pretends that is all God is concerned with. Yes, He wanted to reach that goal but had lots of supporting items to do to achieve it.