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Bacterial adaptation to hot and dry deserts

  • Chapter
Adaption of Microbial Life to Environmental Extremes

Abstract

Prokaryotic microorganisms are known to be highly adaptable to diverse environmental conditions and to thrive in harsh environments. Halophilic microorganisms (Bacteria and Archaea) tolerate and grow in the presence of salt concentrations 10 times higher than seawater, whereas acidophiles withstand a pH of 1, and hyperthermophiles face temperatures above 85°C. Bacteria are able to sense changing environmental parameters such as temperature, pressure, pH, ionic strength, solute concentrations and water availability, and to adapt by protecting biological molecules and adjusting biochemical reactions in response to extreme conditions.

The Moula-moula bird is a wheatear of the Desert. It is the only living soul that might enliven the desolation of volcanic areas with its two, black and white, clean-cut colours. I often used to follow it with my eyes, as it would tinkle its faint trill above the bald heights of the hillocks. It cannot stay still as its feet would get burned by the rock. The sun, which would elsewhere be life, here is devastating furnace. Only, there is the Moula-moula bird to pour a note of freshness on the inferno. Its faint trill furtively gives the illusion of greenness; it falls upon the ardent rocks as drops of dew. One only has to close one’s eyes and listen to the crystal shrill then one forgets this bare world reduced to its vertebral column and also forgets the surveying mineral world. Tahar Djaout (1954-1993) L’invention du desert (Éditions du Seuil, 1987) Kindly translated from French by Gaëlle Catois

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Microbial Ecology of the Rhizosphere and Extreme Environment (LEMIRE), UMR 6191 CNRS-CEA-Aix-Marseille Univ., Institute of Environmental Biology and Biotechnology (iBEB), CEA/Cadarache, St-Paul-lez-Durance, France

    Thierry Heulin, Gilles De Luca, Mohamed Barakat, Arjan de Groot, Laurence Blanchard, Philippe Ortet & Wafa Achouak

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  1. Thierry Heulin
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  2. Gilles De Luca
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  3. Mohamed Barakat
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  4. Arjan de Groot
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  5. Laurence Blanchard
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  6. Philippe Ortet
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  7. Wafa Achouak
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Microbiology, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria

    Helga Stan-Lotter

  2. Romanian Bioresource Center and Advanced Research Association, Bucharest, Romania

    Sergiu Fendrihan

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Heulin, T. et al. (2012). Bacterial adaptation to hot and dry deserts. In: Stan-Lotter, H., Fendrihan, S. (eds) Adaption of Microbial Life to Environmental Extremes. Springer, Vienna. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-211-99691-1_4

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