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From the University of Colorado at Boulder, proof that life can inhabit just about anywhere. CU-Boulder-led team finds microbes in extreme environment on South American volcanoesA CU-Boulder-led team has discovered some rare, primitive microorganisms on high volcanoes in South America that may be fueled by drifting gases in the region rather than photosynthesis. Credit: University of Colorado A team led by the University of Colorado Boulder looking for organisms that eke out a living in some of the most inhospitable soils on Earth has found a hardy few.A new DNA analysis of rocky soils in the Martian-like landscape on some...

[We] will discuss efforts to assemble minimal self-replicating nanomachines from nonliving organic and inorganic matter. These protocells do not necessarily look anything like life-as-we-know-it. For example, the current protocell design does not have a single biomolecule in common with a modern living cell and the protocell is also about a million times smaller than a modern cell. This research is not concerned about the historical details of the origins of life, but more about how nonliving matter can self-organize into living matter. At the same time this work is likely to inform research about the origins of life on Earth...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - There are more than 210,000 known life forms in the world's oceans, but this could be a fraction of the total number of marine species, according to early results from a marine census released on Thursday. Scientists from around the world are expected to complete the census of the world's oceans by 2010, when they hope to have a better understanding of the waters that cover nearly 70 percent of the Earth's surface. With nearly half of the world's population of 6.3 billion living along ocean coasts, experts say the big deep has been under-explored. "The census...