[extropy-chat] NANO/ID: Spooky nanowire crappying bacteria...

[Adrian Tymes]

--- Mike Lorrey <mlorrey at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Okay. Either these little guys were engineered by a crypto dirt
> civilization, or there may be something to ID. What is the
> evolutionary
> point of a bacteria that craps conductive nano-wires?

Just in case you were serious, or anyone thinks you were, the article
itself answers that question:

> it uses metals, rather than oxygen, for respiration

> it explains
> Geobacter's ability to remove metals from soil and water. A key step
> in
> its metabolism is the transfer of electrons from its interior to
> metals
> in its surroundings.

The wires help the bacteria gather that which they use for respiration.
If your blood supply was external, you'd want to make it really easy to
gather blood too.