An international group of scientists from Russia and America have discovered bacteria of the genus Carnobacterium on the banks of the Kolyma river in the permafrost. These microorganisms can grow and multiply at a temperature, oxygen concentration and pressure, which correspond to the atmosphere of Mars. Spiegel Online sends a summary of the work, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Researchers have learned bacteria from a depth of 12-20 meters from the sandy sediments, located on the right Bank of the Kolyma river. Washing out the samples of sand, scientists were planted solution on the environment, rich in nutrients. Grown colonies of bacteria at a temperature of 28 degrees Celsius in a normal atmosphere, and then exposed them to the test conditions of the red planet.

The duration of the experiment was 30 days. Only six out of 10 thousand isolated strains were able to grow at low oxygen zero temperature and pressure 150 times less than the earth - 7 millibars. All of them were representatives of the genus Carnobacterium. Surprisingly, one of the strains grew up in such conditions, even better than under normal pressure and oxygen atmosphere.

The obtained results, the authors stress that the important to consider the possibility of existence of life on Mars, and to select the right decisions and directions in her search. Conditions of the Martian environment, meanwhile, is characterized not only by low concentration of oxygen, pressure and temperature, but also a very high level of radiation. The study of the other group of scientists recently demonstrated that on the surface of the red planet, the radiation level is so high that organic matter in depth less than 10 centimeters cannot exist for a long time.