Feast clue to smell of ancient Earth

Tiny 1,900 million-year-old fossils from rocks around Lake Superior, Canada, give the first ever snapshot of organisms eating each other and suggest what the ancient Earth would have smelled like.

Amoeba offers key clue to photosynthetic evolution

(PhysOrg.com) -- The major difference between plant and animal cells is the photosynthetic process, which converts light energy into chemical energy. When light isn't available, energy is generated by breaking down carbohydrates ...

Scientists discover first new chlorophyll in 60 years

(PhysOrg.com) -- University of Sydney scientists have stumbled upon the first new chlorophyll to be discovered in over 60 years and have published their findings in the international journal Science.

Modifying one cell factor alters many others

Using a widely studied species of cyanobacterium, researchers from the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Sciences have shown how difficult it is to alter the metabolism of a unicellular organism with the aim of producing ...

Blue-green algae a five-tool player in converting waste to fuel

In the baseball world, a superstar can do five things exceptionally well: hit, hit for power, run, throw and field. In the parallel universe of the microbiological world, there is a current superstar species of blue-green ...

Researchers discover global warming may affect microbe survival

Arizona State University researchers have discovered for the first time that temperature determines where key soil microbes can thrive—microbes that are critical to forming topsoil crusts in arid lands. And of concern, ...

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Cyanobacteria

The taxonomy is currently under revision

Chroococcales (suborders-Chamaesiphonales and Pleurocapsales)

Nostocales (= Hormogonales or Oscillatoriales)

Stigonematales

Cyanobacteria (English pronunciation: /saɪˌænoʊbækˈtɪəriə/; also known as blue-green algae, blue-green bacteria, and Cyanophyta) is a phylum of bacteria that obtain their energy through photosynthesis. The name "cyanobacteria" comes from the color of the bacteria (Greek: κυανός (kyanós) = blue).

The ability of cyanobacteria to perform oxygenic photosynthesis is thought to have converted the early reducing atmosphere into an oxidizing one, which dramatically changed the composition of life forms on Earth by stimulating biodiversity and leading to the near-extinction of oxygen-intolerant organisms. According to endosymbiotic theory, chloroplasts in plants and eukaryotic algae have evolved from cyanobacterial ancestors via endosymbiosis.

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