We can’t see them, but there are more microbes — tiny fungi, bacteria, worms and other living things — in a teaspoon of soil than there are people on Earth. Hungry as you and me, those microbes gobble up bits of plant and animal material. And just like you and me, soil microbes release greenhouse […]
A long-feared scenario in which global warming causes Arctic permafrost to melt and release enough methane—a potent greenhouse gas–to accelerate warming and cause catastrophe probably won’t happen. That is the conclusion of a study appearing in the journal Science that began more than 20 years ago as a query posed by Jeff Severinghaus, a geoscientist at the Scripps Institution […]
Image-Researchers studied changes in soil microbes in tundra near Denali National Park in Alaska. Credit: Ted Schuur Rising temperatures in the tundra of northern latitudes could affect microbial communities in ways likely to increase their production of the greenhouse gases methane and carbon dioxide, a new study of experimentally warmed Alaskan soil suggests. The […]
Bacteria play a major role in cleaning up oil spills and mitigating its environmental impacts. A new review examines the major limiting factors for microbial degradation in Arctic environments. New economic developments in the Arctic, such as trans-Arctic shipping and oil exploitation, will bring along unprecedented risks of marine oil spills. The world is therefore […]