[bedolido]

great article. Thanks for the post

[norraad]

This is also related to how the earth creates crude oil.

[jerseygirl]

Very intriguing! Thanks.

[microgood]

suggests that all life on earth may have originated from a microbe that breathed iron

Talk about wild speculation. More primordial soup drivel.

[RonF]

The findings of various microbes that can thrive in extreme environments that had heretofore been thought inimicable to life fuel speculation that Mars may not be dead after all.

[RonF]

And much animal life as we know it still depends on varying oxidations states of iron, one atom in every molecule of haemoglobin.

[balrog666]

Ping.

[JmyBryan]

Excellent book "Oxygen: The Molecule That Made the World" by Nick Lane - related to this topic. (Not for Creationists - uses evil evolution premise)

[MonroeDNA]

Nice read! I want to read the whole thing. Anyone got a NYT password/ID?

[<1/1,000,000th%]

When brought to the surface, the creatures smelled of rotten eggs, a sign of sulfur. It turned out that the ecosystem's main energy source was sulfur compounds emitted by the hot vents, in particular hydrogen sulfide.

Aliens from Io.

[wendy1946]

That discovery, he and other scientists say, suggests that all life on earth may have originated from a microbe that breathed iron..."

Absolutely no way did our entire biosphere arise from any such. You still have the Haldane dilemma which says that our biosphere would take quadrillions of years to arise via evolution even if that were possible (it isn't), and you have petroglyphs showing known dinosaur types and soft tissue in dinosaur remains indicating that the 65,000,000 years we've had drummed into our heads all our lives are basically whiteman's fairytales.

There isn't time for our biosphere to have evolved from iron eating microbes.