Extreme Environment
An extreme environment is a habitat that is considered very hard to survive in due to its considerably extreme conditions such as temperature, accessibility to different energy sources or under high pressure. For an area to be considered an extreme environment, it must contain certain conditions and aspects that are considered very hard for other life forms to survive. Pressure conditions may be extremely high or low; high or low content of oxygen or carbon dioxide in the atmosphere; high levels of radiation, acidity, or alkalinity; absence of water; water containing a high concentration of salt; the presence of sulphur, petroleum, and other toxic substances. Examples of extreme environments include the geographical poles, very arid deserts, volcanoes, deep ocean trenches, upper atmosphere, outer space, and the environments of every planet in the Solar System except the Earth. Any organisms living in these conditions are often very well adapted to their living circumstances, which ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Geographical Pole
A geographical pole or geographic pole is either of the two points on Earth where its axis of rotation intersects its surface. The North Pole lies in the Arctic Ocean while the South Pole is in Antarctica. North and South poles are also defined for other planets or satellites in the Solar System, with a North pole being on the same side of the invariable plane as Earth's North pole. Relative to Earth's surface, the geographic poles move by a few metres over periods of a few years. This is a combination of Chandler wobble, a free oscillation with a period of about 433 days; an annual motion responding to seasonal movements of air and water masses; and an irregular drift towards the 80th west meridian. As cartography requires exact and unchanging coordinates, the averaged locations of geographical poles are taken as fixed ''cartographic poles'' and become the points where the body's great circles of longitude intersect. See also * Earth's rotation * Polar motion * Poles of as ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Habitats
In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical manifestation of its ecological niche. Thus "habitat" is a species-specific term, fundamentally different from concepts such as environment or vegetation assemblages, for which the term "habitat-type" is more appropriate. The physical factors may include (for example): soil, moisture, range of temperature, and light intensity. Biotic factors will include the availability of food and the presence or absence of predators. Every species has particular habitat requirements, with habitat generalist species able to thrive in a wide array of environmental conditions while habitat specialist species requiring a very limited set of factors to survive. The habitat of a species is not necessarily found in a geographical area, it can be the interior ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tardigrade
Tardigrades (), known colloquially as water bears or moss piglets, are a phylum of eight-legged segmented micro-animals. They were first described by the German zoologist Johann August Ephraim Goeze in 1773, who called them Kleiner Wasserbär ("little water bear"). In 1777, the Italian biologist Lazzaro Spallanzani named them Tardigrada (), which means "slow steppers". They have been found in diverse regions of Earth's biospheremountaintops, the deep sea, tropical rainforests, and the Antarctic. Tardigrades are among the most resilient animals known, with individual species able to survive extreme conditions – such as exposure to extreme temperatures, extreme pressures (both high and low), air deprivation, radiation, dehydration, and starvation – that would quickly kill most other known forms of life. Tardigrades have survived exposure to outer space. There are about 1,300 known species in the phylum Tardigrada, a part of the superphylum Ecdysozoa consisting of animals th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bdelloidea
Bdelloidea (Greek ''βδέλλα'', ''bdella'', "leech") is a class of rotifers found in freshwater habitats all over the world. There are over 450 described species of bdelloid rotifers (or 'bdelloids'), distinguished from each other mainly on the basis of morphology. The main characteristics that distinguish bdelloids from related groups of rotifers are exclusively parthenogenetic reproduction and the ability to survive in dry, harsh environments by entering a state of desiccation-induced dormancy (anhydrobiosis) at any life stage. They are often referred to as "ancient asexuals" due to their unique asexual history that spans back to over 25 million years ago through fossil evidence. Bdelloid rotifers are microscopic organisms, typically between 150 and 700 µm in length. Most are slightly too small to be seen with the naked eye, but appear as tiny white dots through even a weak hand lens, especially in bright light. In June 2021, biologists reported the restoration o ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Marine Microorganism
Marine microorganisms are defined by their habitat as microorganisms living in a marine environment, that is, in the saltwater of a sea or ocean or the brackish water of a coastal estuary. A microorganism (or microbe) is any microscopic living organism or virus, that is too small to see with the unaided human eye without magnification. Microorganisms are very diverse. They can be single-celled or multicellular and include bacteria, archaea, viruses and most protozoa, as well as some fungi, algae, and animals, such as rotifers and copepods. Many macroscopic animals and plants have microscopic juvenile stages. Some microbiologists also classify biologically active entities such as viruses and viroids as microorganisms, but others consider these as non-living. Marine microorganisms have been variously estimated to make up about 70%, or about 90%, Modified text was copied from this source, which is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License of the bi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Greenland Shark
The Greenland shark (''Somniosus microcephalus''), also known as the gurry shark, grey shark, or by the Kalaallisut name ''eqalussuaq'', is a large shark of the family Somniosidae ("sleeper sharks"), closely related to the Pacific and southern sleeper sharks. The distribution of this species is mostly restricted to the waters of the North Atlantic Ocean and Arctic Ocean; however, more recent evidence indicates that at great depths it may range as far south as the Caribbean. The Greenland shark has the longest known lifespan of all vertebrate species (estimated to be between 250 and 500 years), and is among the largest extant species of shark. It is a generalist feeder, consuming a variety of available foods. As an adaptation to living at depth, it has a high concentration of trimethylamine ''N''-oxide in its tissues, which causes the meat to be toxic. Greenland shark flesh, treated to reduce toxin levels, is eaten in Iceland as a delicacy known as '' kæstur hákarl''. As it li ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Halicephalobus Mephisto
''Halicephalobus mephisto'' is a species of nematode, among a number of other roundworms, discovered by geoscientists Gaetan Borgonie and Tullis Onstott in 2011. It was detected in ore recovered from deep rock fracture water in several gold mines in South Africa , , and under the surface of the Earth. Onstott said that "it scared the life out of me when I first saw them moving", and explained that "they look like black little swirly things". The finding is significant because no other multicellular organism had ever been detected farther than below the Earth's surface. ''Halicephalobus mephisto'' is resistant to a temperature as high as 37 °C (higher than most terrestrial nematodes can tolerate), it reproduces asexually, and feeds on subterranean bacteria. According to radiocarbon dating, these worms live in groundwater that is 3,000–12,000 years old. The worms are also able to survive in waters with extremely low levels of oxygen, lower than one percent of the level of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Alvinella Pompejana
''Alvinella pompejana'', the Pompeii worm, is a species of deep-sea polychaete worm (commonly referred to as "bristle worms"). It is an extremophile found only at hydrothermal vents in the Pacific Ocean, discovered in the early 1980s off the Galápagos Islands by French marine biologists. Introduction In 1980 Daniel Desbruyères and Lucien Laubier, just few years after the discovery of the first hydrothermal vent system, identified one of the most heat-tolerant animals on Earth — ''Alvinella pompejana'', the Pompeii worm. It was described as a deep-sea polychaete that resides in tubes near hydrothermal vents, along the seafloor. In 1997, marine biologist Craig Cary and colleagues found the same worms in a new section of Pacific Ocean, near Costa Rica, also attached to hydrothermal vents. The new discovery and subsequent work led to important progress in the scientific knowledge of these special worms. They can reach up to in length and are pale gray, with red tentacle-like ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Giant Kangaroo Rat
The giant kangaroo rat (''Dipodomys ingens'') is an endangered species of heteromyid rodent endemic to California. Description The giant kangaroo rat, is the largest of over 20 species of kangaroo rats, which are small members of the rodent family, measuring about in length, including its long, tufted tail. It is tan or brown in color. Like other kangaroo rats it has a large head and large eyes, and long, strong hind leg with which helps it hop at high speeds. The giant kangaroo rat has been recently added to the endangered species list due to its habitat being severely reduced. Data was collected on its foraging behavior and social structure. Traps baited kangaroo rats with oats in them for four weeks in the summer. The animals were captured, tagged with tracking devices and set free. Results show that significantly fewer males were captured. This could have been due to the time of year at which the experiment was tested. Females were found to be more social. Studies also sh ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Different Types Of Animals
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the most frequently used word in the English language; studies and analyses of texts have found it to account for seven percent of all printed English-language words. It is derived from gendered articles in Old English which combined in Middle English and now has a single form used with pronouns of any gender. The word can be used with both singular and plural nouns, and with a noun that starts with any letter. This is different from many other languages, which have different forms of the definite article for different genders or numbers. Pronunciation In most dialects, "the" is pronounced as (with the voiced dental fricative followed by a schwa) when followed by a consonant sound, and as (homophone of pronoun ''thee'') when followed by a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Microscopic Organisms
A microorganism, or microbe,, ''mikros'', "small") and ''organism'' from the el, ὀργανισμός, ''organismós'', "organism"). It is usually written as a single word but is sometimes hyphenated (''micro-organism''), especially in older texts. The informal synonym ''microbe'' () comes from μικρός, mikrós, "small" and βίος, bíos, "life". is an organism of microscopic size, which may exist in its single-celled form or as a colony of cells. The possible existence of unseen microbial life was suspected from ancient times, such as in Jain scriptures from sixth century BC India. The scientific study of microorganisms began with their observation under the microscope in the 1670s by Anton van Leeuwenhoek. In the 1850s, Louis Pasteur found that microorganisms caused food spoilage, debunking the theory of spontaneous generation. In the 1880s, Robert Koch discovered that microorganisms caused the diseases tuberculosis, cholera, diphtheria, and anthrax. Because micr ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Organic Compound
In chemistry, organic compounds are generally any chemical compounds that contain carbon-hydrogen or carbon-carbon bonds. Due to carbon's ability to catenate (form chains with other carbon atoms), millions of organic compounds are known. The study of the properties, reactions, and syntheses of organic compounds comprise the discipline known as organic chemistry. For historical reasons, a few classes of carbon-containing compounds (e.g., carbonate salts and cyanide salts), along with a few other exceptions (e.g., carbon dioxide, hydrogen cyanide), are not classified as organic compounds and are considered inorganic. Other than those just named, little consensus exists among chemists on precisely which carbon-containing compounds are excluded, making any rigorous definition of an organic compound elusive. Although organic compounds make up only a small percentage of Earth's crust, they are of central importance because all known life is based on organic compounds. Living t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |