Centuries-old moss managed to come back to life in a warm laboratory. Also incredibly, tiny 42,000-year-old roundworms have come to life. These fascinating glimpses of organisms from Earth’s distant past reveal the history of ancient ecosystems, including details of the environments in which they existed. But the melting ice also raises fears that old viruses could return and infect us.

Detail

Melting the ice will not only lead to the loss of these ancient “archive” microbes and viruses, but will also release them into the environment where they can begin to multiply and mutate. We literally do not know what could be there and how dangerous it is for the human body.

Thanks to metagenomic techniques and new methods for sterilizing ice core samples, researchers have been able to understand a little better what exactly is hidden in the cold. During the research, the team managed to discover a collection of dozens of unique 15,000-year-old viruses found in the Gulia Ice Cap on the Tibetan Plateau and gain insight into their functions.

These glaciers formed slowly, and along with dust and gases, many viruses accumulated in this ice.
– says microbiologist Zhi-Ping Zhong from Ohio State University.

Previous studies have shown that microbial communities are associated with changes in dust and ion concentrations in the atmosphere and may also indicate climate and environmental conditions at the time.

In these frozen records of ancient times found 6.7 kilometers above sea level, researchers found: 28 of the 33 viruses they detected had never been seen before. They appear to be able to thrive in extreme conditions and infect cells in cold environments.

By comparing their genetic sequences with a database of known viruses, the team found that the most common viruses in both ice core samples were bacteriophages that infect Methylbacteria, bacteria important for the methane cycle in ice. These were most closely related to viruses found in Methylobacteria species found in plant and soil habitats; This was consistent with a previous report stating that the main source of dust settling on the Gulia ice cap likely came from soil. “These frozen viruses likely originate from soil or plants and provide nutrients to their hosts.”– finished the team.

While the specter of ancient viruses seems particularly alarming in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the biggest danger is that melting ice will also release large stores of methane and carbon into the atmosphere.

But it is clear that ice may also contain information about past changes in the environment and the evolution of viruses. We know very little about viruses and microbes in these extreme conditions and what actually happens there. How do bacteria and viruses respond to climate change? What happens when we move from an ice age to a warm age? There is a lot to understand.