Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 9, 2026

Adaptation at the Extremes of Life: Experimental Evolution with the Extremophile Archaeon Sulfolobus acidocaldarius
Published on: June 14, 2024
Psychrophilic microorganisms: challenges for life
Salvino D'Amico1, Tony Collins, Jean-Claude Marx
1Laboratory of Biochemistry, Institute of Chemistry B6, University of Liege, Sart-Tilman, Belgium.
Abstract:
The ability of psychrophiles to survive and proliferate at low temperatures implies that they have overcome key barriers inherent to permanently cold environments. These challenges include: reduced enzyme activity; decreased membrane fluidity; altered transport of nutrients and waste products; decreased rates of transcription, translation and cell division; protein cold-denaturation; inappropriate protein folding; and intracellular ice formation. Cold-adapted organisms have successfully evolved features, genotypic and/or phenotypic, to surmount the negative effects of low temperatures and to enable growth in these extreme environments. In this review, we discuss the current knowledge of these adaptations as gained from extensive biochemical and biophysical studies and also from genomics and proteomics.
Related Concept Videos
Factors Influencing Microbial Growth: Temperature
Diversity of Archaea IV
Diversity of Archaea III
Diversity of Archaea I
Hyperthermophilic Bacteria
Factors Influencing Microbial Growth: pH

