Living in The Artic

When you think of Antarctica, the first thing that comes to mind is ice. But is there more to it then we assume. Its harsh temperature and icy environment make it a very difficult place to live in. According to scientists Shawn Doyle and Brent Christner there are microbes in the ice. This of course is extremely hard to believe because if these microbes live in the ice then where would they get there energy? If they can prove that there is life under the glaciers or in them then they can prove that in lakes that are frozen there would be microbes. To go about this the two scientists begin by getting a sample of ice which was most likely the easiest part of the experiment. They then would use these samples by putting them under a heavy duty microscope to see if anything is there. They have not yet found anything because they believe they haven’t looked in the right place yet. The major difficulty with is that the time it is summer there is only daylight which proves for good working conditions but in the winter there is hardly any light and it gets extremely cold along with dangerous environmental conditions make it extremely dangerous to continue in winter. So work gets postponed till the next summer which makes this a hard project. The hugest concern for the scientist is that they don’t know when they will find a microbe because they now its there but don’t know exactly where to find it.
Biology today has progressed greatly, due hundreds of discoveries made by hundreds of smart scientist who gave them selves a task and said they wouldn’t quit till they completed it. Even if Brent and Shawn have not found the microbe they are looking, they still stay determined. Eventually they will find what they are looking for and to our knowledge of biology. That is why this topic is directly related to biology because the discovery of the microbe would contribute to the biological world.
This should be researched some more because a discovery like this can prove the theory that nothing can live in the arctic wrong. This can also prove that under any ice bed there could be possible living organisms that may inhabit it. This story is posted on the internet because it is a key example that science is unpredictable and that you can’t always be too sure of something.



Links:
http://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_summ.jsp?cntn_id=117005&org=NSF