Anaerobic bacteria in rock underground. Because they inhabit cubic volume, not 2D surfaces, there can be no comparison.

xboxnolifes 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I'm not sure what cubic volume vs 2D surfaces means to you, but these comparisons are by mass, not volume. Plus, anaerobic bacteria would only come up on top if you counted all of them as one species, which they are not.

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QuadmasterXLII 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Pretty much all life is 1 g / ml give or take 20%

	▲	IAmBroom 2 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		That is completely irrelevant to this discussion. We weren't asked which animal is the densest.
	▲	hermitcrab 5 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		Even flying animals?

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JoeAltmaier 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[flagged]

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IAmBroom 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Why is that group inherently more massive than waterborne bacteria?

I think the limiting factor in the amount of cellular mass that a volume can contain is probably either carbon content or nitrogen content.

Both maximize in the oceans near to shorelines, with smaller local maxima near some vents.

On land, I'd expect a gradient in both, decreasing with depth, but there's probably more CO2 100-m down in water than in rock.

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TZubiri 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The same argument could be had for fish, since they inhabit the volume of water, instead of the thin land surface of earth.

	▲	JoeAltmaier 5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		They are in zones and layers, yes. But very very thinly spread. Most life in the ocean are withing the top 3 meters.