Posted on 05/14/2017 8:00:08 AM PDT by BenLurkin
[E]nterococci, including those that have never been found in hospitals, were naturally resistant to dryness, starvation, disinfectants and many antibiotics. Because enterococci normally live in the intestines of most (if not all) land animals, it seemed likely that they were also in the intestines of land animals that are now extinct, including dinosaurs and the first millipede-like organisms to crawl onto land. Comparison of the genomes of these bacteria provided evidence that this was indeed the case. In fact, the research team found that new species of enterococci appeared whenever new types of animals appeared. This includes when new types of animals arose right after they first crawled onto land, and when new types of animals arose right after mass extinctions, especially the greatest mass extinction, the End Permian Extinction (251 million years ago).
From sea animals, like fish, intestinal microbes are excreted into the ocean, which usually contains about 5,000 mostly harmless bacteria per drop of water. They sink to the seafloor into microbe-rich sediments, and are consumed by worms, shellfish and other sea scavengers. Those are then eaten by fish, and the microbes continue to circulate throughout the food chain. However, on land, intestinal microbes are excreted as feces, where they often dry out and most die over time.
Not the enterococci, however. These microbes are unusually hardy and can withstand drying out and starvation, which serves them well on land and in hospitals where disinfectants make it difficult for a microbe.
"We now know what genes were gained by enterococci hundreds of millions of years ago, when they became resistant to drying out, and to disinfectants and antibiotics that attack their cell walls," said study leader Michael S. Gilmore, Ph.D., senior scientist at Mass. Eye and Ear and Director of the Harvard Infectious Disease Institute.
(Excerpt) Read more at phys.org ...
Fascinating stuff. Great post.
Makes sense! Thanks for posting.
I wouldn’t think it possible to sequence DNA from 400 million year old fossil bacteria.
I am a bit hung up on Antibiotic-resistant microbes existing before antibiotics existed.
“I am a bit hung up on Antibiotic-resistant microbes existing before antibiotics existed.”
Many antibiotics are naturally occuring molecules produced by fungi. Penicillin is one example.
“I am a bit hung up on Antibiotic-resistant microbes existing before antibiotics existed.”
Molds with antibiotic properties existed before they were formally identified.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_penicillin
Piece of cake, Hillary just offered up some skin cells.
Immigrants bringing in diseases.
Antibiotics we use to kill certain classes of germs were used by other germs in biological warfare against each other before humans existed.
Like plants producing toxins to discourage insects eating them before we learned about the concept of pesticides.
perhaps- but we didn’t have the ‘super bugs’ back then very likely because these new superbugs are almost entirely resistant to several antibiotics at once- making them near impossible to control- in the wild, a bug may be resistant to one perhaps two antibiotics over time, but they likely didn’t become super bugs like we have today from overuse of antibiotics
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.