I Had Always Thought,

that from the highest mountains to the depths of the oceans, 

you would always find life, even if the life-force was just a few microbes, but it is not so, there are two  places on earth where life does not exist, the hot briny lakes in Africa’s Rift Valley, photograph PURI LOPEZ, and the cold, dry soil of Antarctica’s Shackleton Glacier Valley, together the two projects “contradict the current wisdom that life is really everywhere,” says Nathan Smith, a paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County in California who was not involved with either project. “Both, in their own ways, in different types of environments, are homing in on what might be real barriers to life.” for a fuller read about these two fascinating places here is the article.