A big debate researchers have been having about how small life on Earth can get may be over . Scientists from the US Department of Energy 's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California , Berkeley , captured photos of 'ultra-small bacteria ' for the first time . The photos may end a debate which has been raging for two decades.about whether the tiny bacteria exist or not . Scientists from the US Department of Energy 's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California , Berkeley , captured photos of 'ultra-small bacteria ' ( pictured ) Scientists say that the ultra-small bacteria cells have an average volume of 0.009 cubic microns which means that almost 150 of the miniscule bacteria could fit inside an Escherichia coli cell . The comprehensive electron microscopy images and DNA-based description of the microbes researchers were able to obtain seem to indicate the bacteria are very small - but very real . Ultra-small bacteria cells have an average volume of 0.009 cubic microns [ one micron is one millionth of a meter ] , according to Berkeley Lab . Close to 150 of the miniscule bacteria could fit inside an Escherichia coli cell . More than 150,000 Escherichia cells could fit onto the tip of a single human hair . The bacteria were found in groundwater and are believed to be rather common . In their abstract , the scientists wrote : 'Ultrastructural features potentially related to cell and genome size minimization include tightly packed spirals inferred to be DNA , few densely packed ribosomes and a variety of pili-like structures that might enable inter-organism interactions that compensate for biosynthetic capacities inferred to be missing from genomic data . 'The results suggest that extremely small cell size is associated with these relatively common , yet little known organisms . ' Since it was founded in 1931 , Berkeley Lab ( pictured above ) has been recognized with 13 Nobel prizes . Findings about the bacteria were published in the Nature Communications journal . A UC Berkeley professor in the departments of Earth and Planetary Science and Environmental Science , Policy and Management , Jill Banfield , co-wrote the paper with Birgit Luef , a reearchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology . Banfield said : 'These newly described ultra-small bacteria are an example of a subset of the microbial life on earth that we know almost nothing about . 'They 're enigmatic . 'These bacteria are detected in many environments and they probably play important roles in microbial communities and ecosystems . 'But we do n't yet fully understand what these ultra-small bacteria do . ' Luef said their research was ' a significant step in characterizing the size , shape , and internal structure of ultra-small cells ' . She added : 'There is n't a consensus over how small a free-living organism can be , and what the space optimization strategies may be for a cell at the lower size limit for life . ' Since it was founded in 1931 , Berkeley Lab has been recognized with 13 Nobel prizes .
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and University of California , Berkeley , scientists have taken pictures of 'ultra small bacteria ' The researchers believe the bacteria are the smallest form of life on Earth . They were able to get a DNA-based description of the microbes . Bacteria were found in groundwater and are believed to be fairly common .