In a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers report that a small single-celled microbe, a ciliate in the genus Halteria, can subsist and grow entirely by consuming a certain type of virus.

Scientists knew that certain microbes can sometimes consume viruses, but it was thought to have minor importance nutritionally and otherwise, says John DeLong, study lead author and an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln.

But it remains unknown how often this virus-eating, or virovory, happens in the real-world environment, in part because such microscopic interactions are difficult to observe in the wild.

This dynamic leads to boom-bust cycles of organisms, and helps to limit growth of phenomena such as algal blooms, which can be harmful to marine life, Edwards says.

“We don’t know how much it’s happening in nature, but if it is, there’s another pathway that energy and nutrients are moving from bottom to the top… that could play a big role in carbon cycling and processing,” he says.

This would significantly change our perception of the carbon cycle, he says, and have implications for how we understand the ecology of ponds and streams, certain intricacies of the climate system, and more.