Extremophiles are a favorite tool of astrobiologists. But not only are they good for understanding the kinds of extreme environments that life can survive in, sometimes they are useful as actual tools, creating materials necessary for other life – like oxygen – in those extreme environments.

A recent paper from Daniella Billi of the University of Rome Tor Vergata, published in pre-print form in Acta Astronautica , reviews how one particular extremophile fills the role of both useful test subject and useful tool, all at once.

That extremophile is a cyanobacterium called . Unfortunately, biologists don't have the same penchant for shortening names as astronomers do, but we will refer to it as Chroo so I don't have to repeatedly copy and paste the name that I probably already spelled wr

See Full Page