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Fungus in Chernobyl nuclear disaster zone has mutated to 'feed' on radiation (2024)

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73 points thunderbong | 3 comments | 12 Nov 25 15:08 UTC | HN request time: 0.209s | source
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datadrivenangel ◴[12 Nov 25 15:16 UTC] No.45901233[source]▶
Life finds a way.

We're going to see an increase in plastic metabolizing bacteria as well, so eventually our plastics will 'rust' and degrade faster.

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chistev ◴[12 Nov 25 15:19 UTC] No.45901272[source]▶
I was going to ask about plastic eating microbes in my comment. Even metal eating microbes. I wonder how we'll handle that when they start destroying the foundation of civilization. Lol
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dilawar ◴[12 Nov 25 15:29 UTC] No.45901386[source]▶
I few months ago I learnt something related that may be a common knowledge to many here. I feel silly that I didn't know.

Earth had a plastic like problem before. There were no fungi that eat cellulose so dead trees were just piling up without degrading. Those trees turned into ~petroleum~ coal that we consume now.

That trees somehow turned into ~petroleum~ coal, I learnt in school. I used to imagine trees were somehow buried under stand suddenly and before they could be degraded they turned into ~petroleum~ coal under heavy pressure.

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1. chistev ◴[12 Nov 25 15:53 UTC] No.45901678[source]▶
You mean coal. Petroleum was from the dead animals from millions of years ago.
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2. ◴[12 Nov 25 16:14 UTC] No.45901956[source]▶
3. observationist ◴[12 Nov 25 16:15 UTC] No.45901971[source]▶
Algae and phytoplankton, but mostly algae. Not large creatures, generally. You'd get massive blooms with phyto/zoo plankton die-offs, they'd settle, then get buried in sand and sediment. Over centuries and millenia, you'd get cyclic deposits, creating massive accumulations, and then over geologic timeframes, you get pockets of striated deposits of these decomposing materials in high heat and pressure conditions. Once the deposits liquefy, they all flow into a common area.

Depending on the conditions and chemistry, you can get coal from ancient algal sources, but you can't get petroleum / liquid oil from ancient forests - the chemistry doesn't work out. You need lots of water and heat and pressure, single cell structures. Lots of cellulose and lignin means you don't get the liquefaction and mixing, forcing the material to carbonize and compress instead.