Some Like It Hot: What Microbes from Hot Springs Tell Us About Evolution

Archaea are often referred to as “primitive bacteria” because they are masters of survival that thrive in many habitats reminiscent of the early Earth. For example, many of these microorganisms are found in hot and acidic springs, in salt lakes, and on the hot walls of black smokers in the deep sea.

But archaea also play a very significant role in the most important stages of evolution, ranging from the emergence of the first single-celled organisms to the development of plants, animals, and us humans.

In fact, we share far more cellular characteristics with these tiny archaea than was previously believed, as a new group has been discovered in deep-sea sediments from which our immediate ancestors originated. These so-called Asgard archaea have become fascinating subjects of research and hold many surprises.

Speaker: Univ. Prof. Dr. Christa Schleper, Department of Functional and Evolutionary Ecology, University of Vienna

Univ. Prof. Dr. Christa Schleper studied biology in Aachen and Konstanz and earned her Ph.D. in 1993 at the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Munich. After research stays at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and the University of California, Santa Barbara, she completed her habilitation at the University of Darmstadt and took up a professorship at the University of Bergen. Since 2007, she has been a professor and head of the Group for Archaea and Ecogenomics at the University of Vienna, and since 2020 she has also headed the Department of Functional and Evolutionary Ecology.

Prof. Schleper is one of Austria’s most-cited researchers. In 2022, she received the Wittgenstein Prize, one of Austria’s highest scientific honors. She has been a member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW) since 2017; she is also a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) and the American Academy of Microbiology (AAM).