Defrosting Ancient Microbes - Emerging Genomes in a Warmer World

Ice is melting around the world and glaciers are disappearing. Water, which has been solid for thousands and even millions of years, is being released into streams, rivers, lakes and oceans. Embedded in this new fluid water, and now being released, are ancient microbes whose effects on today's organisms and ecosystems is unknown and unpredictable. These long sleeping microbes are becoming physiologically active and may accelerate global climate change. This book explores the emergence of these microbes. The implications for terrestrial life and the life that might exist elsewhere in the universe are explored.

Key Selling Points:

• Explores the role of long frozen ancient microbes will have when released due to global warming
• Describes how ice preserves microbes and microbial genomes for thousands or millions of years
• Reviews work done on permafrost microbiology
• Identifies potential health hazards and environmental risks
• Examines implications for the search for extraterrestrial life.

Table of Contents

1. Reaching Backwards

2. Questions and Answers

3. The Importance of Water and Ice

4. The Diversity of Ice

5. Permafrost

6. What Is Life?

7. Fossils: Marking Time

8. Walking into the Past

9. Isolating and Characterizing Microbes from Ice

10. A Brief History of Research on Life in Ice

11. Ice Core Discoveries

12. Subglacial Lake Vostok

13. Discoveries from Other Ice-Covered Lakes

14. Life Is Everywhere

15. Pathogens in the Environment: Viruses

16. Pathogens, Hazards, and Dangers

17. Everything Old Is New Again, the Ultimate in Recycling

18. Astrobiology—Out of This World

19. Disappearing Ice—Global Climate Change

20. Epilogue