Bacteria Make Gold Nuggets

[n2doc]

By Larry O'Hanlon
Wed Sep 1, 2010 08:39 AM ET

Gold nuggets are often the creations of bacterial biofilms, say Australian researchers who have demonstrated the process and even identified the bacteria at work.

Layers of bacteria can actually dissolve gold into nanoparticles, which move through rocks and soils, and then deposit it in other places, sometimes creating purer "secondary" gold deposits in cracks and crevices of rocks. The process overturns the long-held belief by some scientists that gold ore is created only by "primary" physical geological processes.

By looking at the DNA in biofilms that grow on gold grains collected from the Prophet gold mine in southeast Queensland, Australia , the University of Adelaide's Frank Reith and his colleagues discovered that 90 percent of the bacteria were of just two species Delftia acidovorans and Cupriavidus metallidurans. The bacteria share genes that make them resistant to the toxic effects of heavy metals.

"It's the first time we actually see the mechanism laying on top of the gold grain," said Joël Brugger of the South Australian Museum and University of Adelaide, a co-author on a report about the discovery which appears in the September issue of the journal Geology.

more

http://news.discovery.com/earth/gold-bacteria-nuggets.html

[tridim]

1. So shit can be turned into gold!

[Occulus]

5. Somebody give that man a

[toddwv]

2. Ouch. If gold can be mass produced..

time to start buying platinum and other non-gold precious metals before the global economy crashes.

[formercia]

3. The bacteria don't make Gold

They just concentrate finely dispered Gold that is already there. If you ate Gold every day, before long, there would be a fortune under the outhouse, otherwise you're still just a poor, ignorant peckerwood.

[dimbear]

4. California is the Golden State because gold

washed in here from Nevada, if the geologists are right. Don't try to tell me nothing good comes from there.