Symbiotic Bacteria Serve as Hydrogen "Fuel Cells" for Deep-Sea Mussels
Hydrogen fuel cells offer plenty of promise as an alternative fuel source for everything from cars to generators - but they remain expensive, complicated and mostly rare. It turns out that a deep sea ecosystem already uses such portable fuel cells, in a manner of speaking. Researchers have found deep-sea mollusks that live in symbiosis with a bacteria that uses hydrogen as a fuel source. The mussels are the first deep-sea organism shown to consume the hydrogen that belches from the superheated deep-sea vents. Related ArticlesAlgae Live Inside Developing Salamanders' Cells, Scientists FindAn Injection of Symbiotic Cyanobacteria Gives Fish the Power of Photosynthesis (Sort Of)Autonomous Roving Robot Seeks Out Polluted Water to Sustain Its Onboard Plant SymbiotesTagsScience, Rebecca Boyle, bacteria, deep sea, hydrogen fuel cells, hydrothermal vents, marine life, seafloor, symbiosis, symbiotic relationshipA rich diversity of creatures live among hydrothermal vents, where they derive energy from the waste expelled by chemosynthetic microbes....