Extremophile survives the transient pressures associated with impact-induced ejection from Mars
Lily Zhao, Cesar A Perez-Fernandez , Jocelyne DiRuggiero , K T Ramesh
PNAS Nexus, Volume 5, Issue 3, March 2026, pgag018, https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgag018
https://academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/article/5/3/pgag018/8503064?
- Large planetary impacts generate extreme pressures and rapid loading, raising questions about whether microorganisms can survive such events.
- An experimental system was developed to expose microbes to controlled, short-duration high pressures and recover them for survival and molecular analysis.
- The extremophile Deinococcus radiodurans, known for resistance to radiation and space-like conditions, was used as the model organism.
- Microorganisms remained viable after pressures up to ~3 GPa, indicating far greater resilience than previously assumed.
- Increasing pressure triggered biological stress responses, confirmed through transcriptional analysis of impacted samples.
- Results suggest microbes could potentially survive impact ejecta and interplanetary transfer, with implications for planetary protection, mission design, and the lithopanspermia hypothesis.