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Microbe Awakened After 120,000 Years

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(June 15) - A small purple microbe that spent more than 120,000 years in hibernation deep beneath a Greenland ice sheet is alive again. Scientists at Pennsylvania State University revived the bug in a lab by warming it in an incubator over the course of 11 months, Scientific American reported.
The bacterium, which was found under nearly two miles of ice, began producing fresh colonies when it was reawakened.
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Dubbed Herminiimonas glaciei, the bug is ten to 50 times smaller than E. coli and is not harmful to humans, one researcher told the Daily Mail.
Scientists say the discovery suggests that dormant life could be revived from ice particles taken from Mars sometime in the future.
"These extremely cold environments are the best analogues of possible extraterrestrial habitats," a scientist told the Daily Mail.
Get more on this story from the Scientific American and the Daily Mail.
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2009-06-15 13:26:04

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It sounds like something out of a science fiction movie: A tiny purple bug that had been dormant for 120,000 years deep beneath glacial ice is brought back to life in a science lab. No, this one doesn\'t take over the world or cause a pandemic. It\'s actually not harmless to humans. Above, an ice sheet is pictured in Greenland, the country where the microbe was discovered.