Researchers Discover That the Ice Cap is Teeming with Microorganisms
Published:30 May2023 Source:Aarhus University
There are no plants, and only very few animals: people rarely come here. The large glaciers in Greenland have long been perceived as ice deserts. Gigantic ice sheets where conditions for life are extremely harsh.
But now, it seems, we have been wrong. There is much more life on the glaciers than we thought.
Headed by Professor Alexandre Anesio, a group of researchers from the Department of Environmental Science at Aarhus University have discovered that the glaciers are teeming with life. Microbes that have adapted to life on the ice. And not just one or two species. Several thousand different species.
"A small puddle of melt-water on a glacier can easily have 4,000 different species living in it. They live on bacteria, algae, viruses and microscopic fungi. It's a whole ecosystem that we never knew existed until recently," says Alexandre Anesio.