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A guest TQ by Stanley Maloy
Both of the scenarios proposed by David Lipson in answer to TQ #4 make perfect sense, but they only focus on bacteria external to plants and animals (as prompted in the question). However, you could also ask what would be the impact from the demise of the normal microbial biota. Would there be a rapid effect on plant and animal life or a slow effect?
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It depends if you are a human, a cow, or an aphid.
If a human, make sure you get vitamin K supplements plus some other stuff. Of course, if you include the mitochondria in "normal biota," you'd face demise in minutes.
If a cow, you'd starve to death because your main energy source are the volatile fatty acids made by the microbes in your rumen.
If you are an aphid, you'd run out of luck after a while because you can make or obtain from the plant sap you eat a number of amino acids that are normally supplied by endosymbiotic Buchnera.
Posted by: moselio schaechter | December 22, 2006 at 10:23 AM