Yellowstone: Life in Extreme Environments
August 4—7, 2005—Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

The 2005 workshop focused on the ability of life to exist in extreme environments, such as this thermal pool in Yellowstone National Park. (Courtesy David Mencin)
We now understand that life on Earth can live in an extraordinary number of unusual habitats and under what we would consider to be extreme physical conditions. The goal of this workshop is to bring journalists in contact with scientist who are at the forefront of the exploration of life in these environments. We are focusing on several broad areas, using Yellowstone National Park and its hydrothermal system as our backdrop.
Themes:
- What conditions determine the limits of life?
A look at the forms of energy required to support life, tolerances that influence limits on life, adaptive strategies of life, and an assessment of the diverse resources essential to life. - What is the functional diversity of life?
Topics include the physiology and structure of extremophiles, stress responses to temperature and pH, community interactions, microbial diversity, and the evolutionary adaptation to extreme environments. - How does life evolve from pre-biotic conditions?
An examination of the origin of life in an extreme environment, modern analogues of the early Earth, physical and chemical prerequisites of life, and looking for life elsewhere in the solar system.
Papers:
- Thermophiles (246 KB PDF)
- What is life? (98 KB PDF)
- Linking geochemical processes with microbial community analysis (471 KB PDF)
- Hydrogen and energy flow as ”sensed” by molecular genetics (139 KB PDF)
- The universal nature of biochemistry (90 KB PDF)
- A molecular view of microbial diversity and the biosphere (541 KB PDF)
- Hydrogen and bioenergetics in the yellowstone geothermal ecosystem (631 KB PDF)
- Geobiology of a microbial endolithic community in the Yellowstone geothermal environment (307 KB PDF)
- Preservation of biological information in thermal spring deposits: developing a strategy for the search for fossil life on Mars (1.6 MB PDF)
- Life in extreme environments (983 KB PDF)
- Evidence for a hydrogen-driven, intra-terrestrial biosphere in deep granitic rock aquifers (66 KB PDF)
- Psychrophiles and polar regions (111 KB PDF)
- Microbial life breathes deep (360 KB PDF)
- Distributions of microbial activities in deep subseafloor sediments (328 KB PDF)
- A hydrogen-based subsurface microbial community dominated by methanogens (168 KB PDF)
- Merging Genomes with Geochemistry in Hydrothermal Ecosystems (946 KB PDF)
- Microbiology in Yellowstone National Park (193 KB PDF)
- Microbiology of ancient and modern hydrothermal systems (1 MB PDF)
- The Seven Pillars of Life (147 KB PDF)
- Conservation of Microbial Diversity A Yellowstone Priority (139 KB PDF)
Presentations:
- The Cold Earth—Dr. Corien Bakermans (1.5 MB PDF)
- The Effects of Temperature on Life—Dr. Corien Bakermans (2.3 MB PDF)
- Chemical Gradients and Life—Prof. Steve D’Hondt (164 KB PDF)
- Life in the Deep Subsurface—Prof. Steve D’Hondt (2.1 MB PDF)
- Fluid-Rock Interactions and the Origin of Hot Spring Fluids—Prof. Steve D’Hondt (745 KB PDF)
- The Interchange between Life and its Geochemical Environment—Prof. Steve D’Hondt (696 KB PDF)
- Biosignatures—Dr. David Des Marais (33.7 MB PDF)
- What is Life?—Dr. David Des Marais (24 MB PDF)
- Mars Exploration Rover: Following the Water—Dr. David Des Marais (110.7 MB PDF)
- Life in Extreme Environments: Searching for Life Beyond Earth—Dr. David Des Marais (18.7 MB PDF)
- Hydrothermal systems: the site of the origin and early evolution of life?—Dr. Tom McCollom (22.4 MB PDF)
- Hot springs (Norris Slides)—Dr. Tom McCollom (664 KB PDF)
- The Thermodynamics of Chemosynthetic Life—Dr. Tom McCollom (9.5 MB PDF)
- Timeline: Life on Earth—Prof. Norman Pace (897 KB PDF)
- Bacteria Tree—Prof. Norman Pace (78 KB PDF)
- Metabolism and thermodynamics of hot spring living—Prof. Anna-Louise Reysenbach (180 KB PDF)
- Yellowstone National Park: A Portal to Astrobiology—Catherine Tsairides (5.5 MB PDF)