Hyper salt tolerant cyanobacteria. Isolation and Identification of a Novel Extremely Salt Tolerant Cyanobacterium from the Hyperarid Yungay region of the Atacama Desert

This newly collected strain was isolated and cultured over a period of three months under two laboratory conditions, and characterization was performed by both morphological observations and molecular studies based on 23S rRNA gene sequences analysis. BLAST analysis showed that it was a novel member of the Gloeocapsa genus that had survived on rock collected from the Atacama Desert after being in storage for over five years after collection. BLAST searches on the 23S rRNA sequence did not produce matches to any known cyanobacteria, therefore we feel confident that we have potentially identified a novel strain. The high salt tolerance of this Atacama-dwelling cyanobacterium makes it an exemplary candidate for use in earth-based analogue studies of how the hyper saline martian environments impacts habitability.