About TBI

Established in 1999 with funding by NASA, the Thermal Biology Institute is a multidisciplinary team of scientists forging a new path in scientific discovery focused on the unique thermal environments within Yellowstone National Park. TBI is currently composed of 14 faculty representing expertise in microbiology, biochemistry, geochemistry, virology, mycology, ecology, plant and animal physiology, and environmentalphysics. In addition to an emphasis on multidisciplinary research, TBI promotes interdisciplinary learning through a strong educational component that incorporates undergraduate, graduate, and post-doctoral training. The TBI engages in productive K-12 outreach, runs a summer continuing education course for science teachers, as well as NSF-funded education efforts for MSU undergraduates (NSF REU) and PhD students (NSF NRT). We also work with Yellowstone Forever, the non-profit arm of Yellowstone National Park, on developing outreach resources.

 

TBI faculty represent some of the best researchers in biochemistry, geochemistry, microbiology, virology, ecology, chemistry, biochemistry, earth science, engineering, environmental science, and plant sciences. Our faculty members are extremely productive and have utilized TBI research funds to leverage additional support from a variety of competitive grant programs including the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF), the Department of Energy (DOE), the Department of Defense (DoD), as well as private foundations, including the Keck, Simons, and Gordon and Betty Moore Foundations. Since 2023, TBI faculty have published 47 publications in peer reviewed journals, including studies in premiere journals in the field: Nature, Science Advances, PNAS, Nature Microbiology, and Nature Communications.

 

The long-term goal of TBI is to understand how organisms respond and adapt to the unique physical and chemical features of geothermal environments. We are committed to furthering scientific understandings of the extreme limits of life on our planet, and working to ensure a sustainable future for research and outreach focused on the geothermal features of Yellowstone National Park.

 

We study high temperature ecosystems because of many reasons. First, we know that four billion years ago, when life originated, Earth’s surface was boiling hot because of constant meteorite impacts. Thus, the habitat life evolved in likely was a hot spring or hydrothermal vent. By studying extreme ecosystems that resemble life’s earliest habitat, we can learn about life’s origins and early evolution. Studying the extreme conditions life can tolerate today also sheds light on the limits of life as we know it and tell us which other celestial bodies in (and beyond) our solar system might harbor life: for example, hydrothermal vents likely exist in the deep ocean of Jupiter’s moon Europa.

 

Second, because of their reduced biological diversity, high temperature ecosystems - like hot springs or mud pots - are ideal model systems to test new scientific approaches and techniques. Many modern molecular biological and microbiological techniques were first tested and benchmarked on extreme ecosystems, including cloning of ribosomal marker genes and DNA-sequencing.

 

Last, the extreme environments of Yellowstone represent a large, untapped potential for the biotechnology and biofuel industry. The most prominent example for this is the discovery of the heat-stable enzyme Taq-polymerase - essentially a photocopy machine that replicates DNA - by Thomas Brock. Funded by a grant by the National Science Foundation, Tom Brock and undergraduate Hudson Freeze discovered the thermophilic bacterium Thermus aquaticus in Mushroom hot spring in 1966. By 1976, Tom had isolated the heat-stable enzyme from the bacterium. In 1983, Kary Mullis invented the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) that used this enzyme to replicate DNA in a laboratory setting. In 1993, Mullis received the Nobel Prize for his invention. The importance of Brock’s and Mullis’ work cannot be overstated. The invention of PCR was so transformative to biology and medicine that it has “virtually divided biology into the two epochs of before PCR and after PCR” (The New York Times). Today, the production of Taq-polymerase and its relatives is a billion dollar industry, and PCR is the foundation for human genome sequencing, Covid- and influenza-tests, cancer mutation detection, identifying congenital disorders, crime scene analysis, victim identification, paternity tests, and the detection of many diseases of plants and animals (e.g., brucellosis in cattle, blue tongue disease in deer in Montana). All that because two curious researchers wanted to study heat-loving bacteria!

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