Cali creature holds evolutionary secrets

Creature found in California's lake holds evolutionary secrets from 650 million years ago

Behold, I am that I am who created this speck!

(Discovery WildScience) California’s Eastern Sierra Nevada is home to Mono Lake, renowned for its striking beauty and unique ecosystem. Its hypersaline and alkaline waters support unique life forms, including brine shrimp and alkali flies, which thrive in conditions that would be uninhabitable to most organisms.

Recently, scientists from the University of California at Berkeley have discovered a microscopic [extremophile] creature living in this extreme environment that could offer clues to the origins of complex life.

This creature, a single-celled choanoflagellate species, offers unprecedented insights into the evolutionary transition from single-celled organisms to multicellular life.

The species’ unique microbiome and symbiotic relationship with bacteria provide clues into how early life forms adapted to extreme environments and formed partnerships that contributed to the development of animal life.

This groundbreaking research not only enriches our understanding of evolution but also underscores the ecological significance of Mono Lake’s extraordinary ecosystem. More

• Discovery WildScience, June 14, 2025; Adolescents, "Amoeba" live footage dubbed original recording; Eds., Wisdom Quarterly

Some germs eat plastic: new microbe

Can the Elementals help clean up?

Will microbes and mushrooms save the planet, clean the world, and make human and animal life sustainable like they have for millions of years even after we pump petroleum from the ground and make plastic out of it? Paul Stamets (fungi.com) knows that various species of fungi can remediate the soil by sequestering and cleaning up even atomic waste from Fukushima, to say nothing of oil spills and other corporate human waste products.

• CC Liu, Crystal Q. (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly