Earth Observatory: Microbe Has Huge Role in Ocean Life, Carbon Cycle

I love it. A tiny organism -- the smallest free-living cell known -- that was not even observed until 1990 -- may be the most prosperous life form on earth? Microbe Has Huge Role in Ocean Life, Carbon Cycle:

In a publication today in the journal Science, scientists outlined the growing knowledge about SAR11, a group of bacteria so dominant that their combined weight exceeds that of all the fish in the world's oceans. In a marine environment that's low in nutrients and other resources, they are able to survive and replicate in extraordinary numbers—a milliliter of sea water off the Oregon coast might contain 500,000 of these cells.

How beautiful, for the world to be revealing itself, for our advancing knowledge, and for the utter mystery and miracle of it all.

And while I have you here... Check out the NASA Earth Observatory site, and especially their new image gallery. They have an RSS feed that I use that combines a lot of interesting news and images. Very cool stuff.