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Microbiology

A case of bacterial immortality?

Nature volume 407, pages 844–845 (2000)Cite this article

On page 897 of this issue Vreeland et al.1 describe the cultivation of a bacterium from the past. Nothing new about that, you might think. In adverse conditions, some microorganisms form resistant structures called spores that are known to survive for considerable periods of time.

For instance, spores have been found in a 118-year-old can of meat2; and a yeast has been cultured from a 166-year-old bottle of porter ale, and was subsequently used to reproduce the beer3. Findings such as these are rather disconcerting, for we rely on sterilizing or inhibiting the growth of microorganisms in food to prevent food poisoning and product deterioration. Most microbial cultures, however, are killed quite easily by heating, chilling or freezing, disinfection or even — and this is pertinent to Vreeland and colleagues' paper — an abrupt change in salinity (hence the food-preservation techniques of canning, freezing, pickling and salting). But what is new is that Vreeland et al. claim to have isolated bacteria from 250-million-year-old, buried salt crystals. If bacteria can survive for this length of time, why should they die at all?

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Figure 1: Evaporation pans in the Great Salt Lake, Utah, United States.

JAMES L. AMOS/CORBIS

Figure 2: Fluid inclusion in a 20-million-year-old salt crystal, in visible (left) and ultraviolet light.

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  1. Department of Earth Sciences Wills Memorial Building, University of Bristol, Bristol, BS8 1RJ, UK

    R. John Parkes

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Correspondence to R. John Parkes.

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Parkes, R. A case of bacterial immortality?. Nature 407, 844–845 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1038/35038181

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