Which of the following factors has delayed the development of laboratory - based genetic systems in Archaea? a. Archaea do NOT host viruses or plasmids. b. Many archaea grow in extreme or unusual conditions that make the use of agar and traditional mutant screening techniques problematic. c. There are no documented systems of conjugation in Archaea. d. Homologous recombination does NOT occur in Archaea.

b) option is correct

Explanation:

Archaea are the closest modern relatives of Earth's first living cells Archaea are famous because of living in extreme environments If it's super hot (more than 100° Celsius), freezing, acidic, alkaline, salty, deep in the ocean, even bombarded by gamma or UV radiation, there's probably life there, and that life is probably archaeal species They're also considered very resourceful Many forms of archaea can utilize totally inorganic forms of matter-hydrogen, carbon dioxide or ammonia for example-to generate organic matter themselves