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[i]The original study, funded by NASA, was led by biologist Felisa Wolfe-Simon, now of the Lawrence Berkeley (Calif.) National Laboratory, and co-authored by other federal researchers. Wolfe-Simon and colleagues had suggested that the microbe, discovered at California's Mono Lake, "can vary the elemental composition of its basic biomolecules by substituting (arsenic) for (phosphorus)," an extraordinary claim that was essentially based on growing the bug in test tubes with the phosphorus seemingly removed. Tests suggested the bug was incorporating arsenic in places usually reserved for phosphorus, including genetic material, a result considered impossible in theory. Theory looks to have been correct. In the new studies, one headed by Julia Vorholt of Switzerland's ETH Zurich university and the other by Rosemary Redfield of Canada's University of British Columbia, researchers tested the bug, provided by Wolfe-Simon and colleagues, and both found that while it can survive amid high arsenic concentrations, it needs some low level of phosphorus to grow. Further, they found the bug did not incorporate arsenic into its genetic chemistry. The "new research shows that GFAJ-1 does not break the long-held rules of life," says the editorial statement by Science. The bacteria, "is likely adept at scavenging phosphate under harsh conditions, which would help to explain why it can grow even when arsenic is present within the cells," it says. Wolfe-Simon says in response, "There is nothing in the data of these new papers that contradicts our published data." Her team hopes to submit more data on the microbe for publication within a few months, she suggests.[/i]
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