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I hope that helps!
The Proterozoic starts way down, a bit past the white thing with "2 billion years ago" written next to it. It continues almost to the top, stopping on the second twist where it says "Cambrian period". And there will definitely be more about microbes on Accumulating Glitches – they were the only living things around for most of Earth's history and are still the dominant lifeform on the planet, so how could I possibly avoid talking about them? :)
(2/2)
I think the hydrogen & methane are dissolved in the water, so I'm not sure how well they would serve as an alternative energy source. Actually, since everything I saw in the paper was about isotope ratios, I'm not even sure what "rich" means here. It might just mean "much more than usual" but still not be much in absolute terms.
There's definitely a risk of contamination. The honest answer to the samples were taken and preserved is: I don't know. They described sealing the borehole with a "packer" and using a container designed to minimize contamination; they also let gas & water flow through to get rid of any remaining air before sampling. This is way outside my area of expertise, so I'm not in a position to critically evaluate their approach -- in fact, I'm not even sure I understand how they did it. I accept their work because I trust that it's been reviewed by someone who does know enough to be critical.
(1/2)
The world is certainly full of surprises and we can't know what we'll find unless we go out and look.
How is a sample like that preserved? When we touch it don't we immediately change it?
Is there an image of D.audaxviator from the South African sample?
Thanks Sedeer, i love the idea of connecting Earth's crust, Earth's surface, Earth's clouds, and Mars, all thinking in a thread of microbes.
ps-Where is Proterozoic on that spiral time/map?
pps-More on microbes, please!
Also, I strongly believe that one never, ever can know what practical benefits can come from discovering the tricks that previously unknown life may have. The history of science is full of examples. Just by studying fundamental biology we can have and have indeed gotten practical benefits in engineering and medicine among other fields. It is an oft used phrase, but truly, you will never know what you will get.
In a related note as for the ET life possibilities, yes, indeed, we can learn something, but beyond that, we can learn things that can help US survive whe we go "out there". Thanks for yet another great post!