Researchers have discovered in the Arctic ice of the North Pole, a virus that causes diseases in plants, which has been remarkably preserved; Scientists have found bacteria that managed to live inside the clouds. The bacteria have to deal with particularly difficult living conditions, such as intense temperatures and ultraviolet radiation; The discovery suggests the possibility of life above the atmosphere
31.8.2000
A team of American researchers discovered the world's first virus that was well preserved in ice. Following the discovery, the scientists are now warning against additional viruses of this type, which may be discovered in the future. And because of hot weather, which may release them and spread them around the world - thus starting a chain of epidemics, among them severe ones, which have disappeared from the world in recent years.
The scientific journal "New Scientist" reported on the discovery of the virus - "Tomato mosaic tobamo-virus" its name - a well-known and widespread pathogen (plant pathogen). The researchers warned against the possibility that other viruses, including those that cause influenza, smallpox and polio, may be well preserved in the Arctic ice. The head of the team of researchers, Tom Starmer from Syracuse University, said: "It is still unknown how much the virus survives, how often and how it might return to the environment - but this is a situation that can be defined as a 'safe possibility'." Starmer and his colleagues noted that the virus has survived in the ice for hundreds of years, because it is from a family of viruses with a hard protein shell, "it is stable, spreads quickly, and moves through the atmosphere", emphasized the American researcher. In the study, four ice cores were examined, from three different places on the island of Greenland. Ice age: 500 to 140 thousand years old. To prevent the researchers from contracting the virus, they were disinfected with ultraviolet light.
The search for the intracellular material, the RNA of the virus, is done with an innovative technology called the "polymerase chain reaction" (PCR). This action revealed 15 different strains of the same virus.
It is still unclear whether the PCR method did not destroy the ability of the virus to penetrate the cells it usually attacks, since the method is based on an action that focuses on the genetic material of the virus. Calciviruses, which originate from the sea, were discovered in the past. They cause diarrhea. Each outbreak of them creates a new epidemic. This type of diarrhea-epidemic appeared mainly in the USA. The study of these viruses revealed that they appear in cycles, with breaks of 20 years between each outbreak. Now the researchers believe that it is possible that viruses identical to calciviruses could have been found in the polar ice for many years - before they broke out of it, spread around the world and caused diseases.
The researchers also estimate that it is very possible that the modern viruses are the result of a mixture between modern viruses and those that were preserved deep frozen in ice for hundreds of years.
"It is possible, they added, that these are ancient populations that have gone through recycling processes over and over again - a situation that makes it difficult for research trying to trace the evolutionary development of viruses."
And life has a high survival rate even in other hostile places on Earth: bacteria live and grow in the clouds, and they may trigger climate change. The revolutionary discovery was made by a team of Austrian researchers, who observed the clouds sailing over the Alps.
"We were amazed to discover the active activity of bacteria," said Dr. Brigitte Sattler from the University of Innsbruck in Austria. According to her, although scientists believed until now that bacteria did not reach the layers above the atmosphere, no one knew if there could be life in the clouds. "The relatively clean and cold atmosphere at high altitude was not considered suitable for the bacteria's life."
However, bacteria do live there, as Sattler and her colleagues found when they observed cloud samples that moved over the meteorological station under Mount Sonneblick, near the city of Salzburg. Water droplets from the clouds were frozen into Teflon plates and then thawed in the laboratory. The researchers found that in every millimeter of dissolved water from the clouds, an amount of 1500 living bacteria was found.
To survive in such conditions, the bacteria must withstand harsh conditions, such as sub-zero temperatures and intense ultraviolet radiation. Identification of the bacteria will make it possible to find out whether they originate from space or from the earth. The researchers intend to find out what the food sources of the bacteria are, and how they multiply. In the next step, the DNA structure of the bacteria will be analyzed, in order to identify the exact species. "So far we have proven that there is life, somewhere," said Sattler, "now we want to know who exactly is hanging around there."
