The creatures are known as “extremophiles,” and they earn the name: They live in toxic Superfund cleanup sites, boiling deep-sea rift vents, volcanic craters and polar glaciers — some of the planet’s harshest environments. These single-celled creatures owe their hardiness to genes, and that has drawn the attention of a few biotech companies. The companies train the genes to mass produce industrial-strength enzymes for such products as better detergents, cleaner chemicals and more effective DNA fingerprints.
