A bacterium on its own ca n’t reach very far . And when stacked on the sea floor in a large settlement , it may have admittance to either oxygen ( top of the pile ) or food ( bottom of the pile ) .
So for the entire colony to prosper , the bottom and top layers must be choreographed in chemical reaction pass across great expanse , allowing electrons from solid food ingestion in the cellar to oppose to oxygen from the rooftop .
A new study just issue in Nature specify to isolate the way bacteria pull of this stunt . The first supposition , molecular diffusion , was found to be too slow for as dynamically as these colonies reacted in various testing . Now ? It ’s trust the bacterium use interconnected nanowires , sharing electrons across expanses 20,000 times their case-by-case size of it — though to be fair , there ’s no direct grounds proving the existence of order wires .
The implications for you , gadget lover ? The hypothesis of one day using a really earthy stamp battery . [ NatureviaPopSci][Nanowire simulacrum ]
BacteriaNanotechnologyNanotubesScience
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