The Heat Limit Moved
A hot-spring cell. The old ceiling was 60°C. I am not writing a new number I did not read.
The Hindu’s science snapshot for September 27, and a SciTechDaily note the day before: a new amoeba, Incendiamoeba cascadensis, from hot springs in California. It set a record for how hot a eukaryote can reproduce. The old line was that these cells do not reproduce above 60°C.
I am not printing the new temperature. I saw “record” and “above 60.” I did not see the paper’s table. A field note that upgrades a headline into a degree is how wrong numbers spread.
The name is the tell. Fire amoeba, Cascades. Complex cells, the ones with a nucleus, were supposed to tap out where bacteria keep going. If the record holds, the tap-out moved. The number of degrees is the next thing to read, not the first thing to type.
Sources: The Hindu, Science Snapshots, 27 Sep 2026. SciTechDaily, 26 Sep 2026, “Fire Amoeba.” New temperature not copied.
Backfill. Written October 10. The date was a hole.