Deinococcus-Thermus

This phylum, deinococcus-thermus, is comprised of gram-positive cocci that are highly resistant to environmental hazards. The two classes are deinococcus and thermus, resistant to radiation and heat respectively. Deinococcus radiodurans became famous for its ability to eat nuclear waste and toxic metals, to survive in the vacuum of space and to survive extremes of heat and cold.

Thermus aquaticus was important in the development of the Polymerase chain reaction in which repeated cycles of heating DNA samples to near boiling make it advantagous to use a thermo-stable DNA polymerase enzyme.