Sulfolobus islandicus is an archaeon – one of many single-celled
microbes that thrive in extreme environments. Mutnovsky volcano
is certainly one such place. Found at the far eastern end of
Russia, it’s full of churning, scalding springs that are
nonetheless teeming with microscopic life. S.islandicus thrives
in these springs, feasting on the sulphur within the water. Now,
Rachel Whitaker from the University of Illinois has found that
the species has pretty much split into two separate lineages.
Both share the same water, and they can trade genes with one
another, but they have started to part ways and are becoming
increasingly distant. In this hot, hostile and acidic world, the
origin of the species is playing out before our eyes. Whitaker
collected 12 strains of S.islandicus from one of the Mutnovsky
springs, sequenced their complete genomes and charted their
evolutionary relationships. They were remarkably similar. At
most, any two strains differed in just 0.35 per cent of their
genome – far less than the