Scientists Found Ancient, Never-Before-Seen Viruses in a Glacier (vice.com) 71
Glacial viruses are understudied, and climate change may keep it that way. From a report: 15,000 years ago, some water froze atop the Tibetan Plateau and became part of a glacier. While humans were busy domesticating dogs, the ice entrapped millions of microscopic organisms per square inch. Many of the tiny life forms died, and their genomes -- the only proof that they had been there in the first place -- slowly degraded. Then, in 2015, scientists from the U.S. and China drilled down 50 meters into the glacier to see what they could find. Five years later, these researchers have recovered evidence of ancient viruses in the glacier ice, including 28 viral groups that are new to science. Their study detailing the discovery was posted online as a pre-print on Tuesday. Records of ancient microbes, like those found in glacier ice, give scientists a glimpse into Earth's evolutionary and climate history. As our planet undergoes climate change, these frozen records can inform predictions about which microorganisms will survive, and what the resulting environment will look like.
"Glacier ice harbors diverse microbes, yet the associated viruses and their impacts on ice microbiomes have been unexplored," the authors wrote in the paper. The group declined to comment on the paper, as it has not yet been peer-reviewed -- "This is an exciting new area of research for us," co-author Lonnie Thompson said in an email. Viruses found in glacial samples known as ice cores are especially understudied because of how small they are, said Scott O. Rogers, a professor at Bowling Green State University and an author of the book Defrosting Ancient Microbes: Emerging Genomes in a Warmer World.
"Glacier ice harbors diverse microbes, yet the associated viruses and their impacts on ice microbiomes have been unexplored," the authors wrote in the paper. The group declined to comment on the paper, as it has not yet been peer-reviewed -- "This is an exciting new area of research for us," co-author Lonnie Thompson said in an email. Viruses found in glacial samples known as ice cores are especially understudied because of how small they are, said Scott O. Rogers, a professor at Bowling Green State University and an author of the book Defrosting Ancient Microbes: Emerging Genomes in a Warmer World.
Sure... (Score:5, Funny)
What could possibly go wrong?
Natural Selection is never wrong (Score:5, Interesting)
You seem to be overlooking that natural selection has already done away with them in the wider biosphere.
Re:Natural Selection is never wrong (Score:5, Interesting)
And we threw away the Smallpox Vaccine... (Score:5, Insightful)
There are Unknown Unknown Black Swan events awaiting us in our future, the horror of which we cannot even begin to comprehend.
And these abject lunatic fools in biology - with their CRISPR & CAS9 & resurrection of ancient viruses - are fucking with powers which their tiny little pea-brains are utterly incapable of fathoming.
Re:And we threw away the Smallpox Vaccine... (Score:5, Insightful)
And these abject lunatic fools in biology - with their CRISPR & CAS9 & resurrection of ancient viruses - are fucking with powers which their tiny little pea-brains are utterly incapable of fathoming.
In the case of the ancient viruses buried in glaciers, they're coming back soon regardless of whether or not we drill them out. The glaciers are going to melt and those viruses are going to end up in the oceans.
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And these abject lunatic fools in biology - with their CRISPR & CAS9 & resurrection of ancient viruses - are fucking with powers which their tiny little pea-brains are utterly incapable of fathoming.
But YOUR brain totally CAN fathom it. You've seen too many movies. This isn't the movies.
No, to the contrary... (Score:4, Interesting)
No, but my brain IS large enough to realize that it CANNOT fathom all of the possible scenarios.
Whereas the typical biology-major-idiot's brain is most decidedly not that big [otherwise they wouldn't be fucking with the kind of doomsday technology which they fuck with on a regular basis].
Any honest observer can only confess that we DO NOT KNOW all of the implications of what we are fucking with here, but that many of the worst-case-scenarios [however probable or improbable] involve shiznat such as the extinction of Homo sapiens.
Hell, even a middling scenario, such as a rapid resurgence of smallpox [in the absence of any vaccine stocks whatsoever] could kill hundreds of millions of people.
BTW, are you paying any attention to what Chinese "hygiene" has done to world's swine population?
Something like ONE QUARTER of all the pigs on the planet Earth died in the last few months of 2019.
If that were humans, then you'd be looking at about TWO BILLION DEATHS.
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Do you actually **believe** that Dugway destroyed anything? Back when Commander in Chief Clinton directly ordered the US military to stop working on bioweapons all the Pentagram did is move the programs to the Black Budget and change their names. No one even had to change desks (and the anthrax used in the 2001 attacks came from one of those desks). The CDC may have destroyed their stores, but I'll guarantee that Dugway didn't.
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Even if the vaccine has been destroyed (I'm neutral on that ; I distrust the honesty of the military as much as anyone else, if not less), they do have records of their genomes. Recreating the virus was almost certainly something that the Black Ops people had checked before they OK'd the destruction of the public stocks.
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No I'm not. Their survival is a precondition to them infecting anything and all viruses require a compatible host.
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Re: Natural Selection is never wrong (Score:2)
Re: Natural Selection is never wrong (Score:2)
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No, that's not how natural selection works. You only have to look at overly succesful invasive species to see why.
These strains haven't been done away with in the wider biosphere - they've been done away with in only the localised areas they were present. This does not mean that they're not fit elsewhere. It's perfectly possible a strain that adapted to survive the slower moving lower energy environments of the arctic becomes super-charged when brought into a temperate or tropical climate where there's an a
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The second statement is not a valid deduction from the first. The "fact" (itself worth closer inspection, hence the quote marks) that the viruses have never been encountered previously does not mean that they don't exist in the wider biosphere. It only means that they've never come to the attention of scientists before, to an extent that sufficient of their genome
Re:Sure... (Score:5, Funny)
I saw that movie too...
time to invest in baked beans, a shotgun and an old bus with bars on the windows.
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"... researchers have recovered evidence of ancient viruses in the glacier ice, including 28 viral groups that are new to science." says the anchor on the TV in the background which nobody in the scene is paying attention to....
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Global warming will do the dirty work soon enough.
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It's not like this wasn't going to melt eventually, was it? I thought that's how glaciers worked. Eager to learn, please explain if I'm wrong.
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It's a matter of time scales. There is a difference between 10,000 years and 100 years.
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There is no reason to think the host species is human or even mammals otherwise they would still be around.
Given they were found in frozen water, it is far more likely that the host was a water borne bacteria. It is just as likely the host is Typhoid or Cholera bacteria.
Re: Sure... (Score:2)
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Yes. Couple things.
- Is that the change in time scale we're looking at though, or is it more like 100 years vs 250 years or something?
- Is sooner better or worse?
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tl;dr - it depends.
Depends on the glacier. If it's sliding from the top of a mountain, then 100 to 10,000 and anything in between is pretty reasonable. For an Antarctica glacier the time scale is more like millions of years. In addition, some glaciers in the world are growing and not receding, so arguing that it must melt doesn't make sense in all circumstances. If we left the climate alone would some glaciers be around a million years from now? Almost certainly. Now that we've monkeyed with our atmosphere
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The Glacial Strain.
Not as scary as The Andromeda Strain [imdb.com]. Good flick btw.
sequals suck (Score:2)
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Actually, this glacial virus is what's causing them to melt and die off . . . and you *really* don't want to be around when the glacier sneezes! :)
hawk
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When the glacier sneezes, stay calm. Drink lots of milk. Try to focus on your breathing. You only have to survive 8 hours, and you should come down.
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The Andromeda Strain
The book was at least OK.
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I was thinking the same. I wonder which interesting pandemics this will lead to.
On the other hand, thanks to climate change old microbes and viruses come to the surface of gletsjers every day. And the DNA of those viruses is probably so damaged that the viruses can't procreate anyway.
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Doesn't have to be DNA.
RNA with protein shell more like it. Procreation is a weird word to describe 'hijack cell reproduction processes to produce new RNA protein shells." It's one step above self replicating molecules. It has a shell!
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I know but not being a native speaker I couldn't find another word for it. If there is any.
And I guess RNA is about as vulnerable as DNA.
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What normally damages cells and DNA from freezing is the water forming ice crystals inside the cell rupturing the cell wall or other structures. Without much water inside a protein shell, a virus is fairly resilient to freezing.
Granted, not all viruses are the same. Some are more complex and would be susceptible while others are rather simple by living organism standards. It is one of the most simplest forms of "life" that exists and even that is debatable. Do viruses dream of RNA sheep?
Great reference (Score:2)
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RNA is more vulnerable than DNA; DNA largely replaced RNA has the permenant genetic storage medium because it's so much more resilient. Crime labs generally test for DNA on samples, not RNA. There's a reason for that.
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RNA is less stable than DNA. Which is why the authors of the study only looked for DNA.
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Is that because DNA is spun into a chromosome to prevent damage while RNA isn't?
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>Dammit can I still use VI?
Absolutely. [nih.gov]
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Ice is frozen water, so probably it is fish [wikipedia.org]. Looks like you're OK.
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Don't worry. Climate change will take care of this if the scientists don't.
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I think this is the whole plot of X-Files.
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No, they're not actually new to us, we were exposed to them only 15,000 years ago. That's an eye blink in evolutionary time.
Besides, most of them wouldn't even be mammal-hosted pathogens, much less human. The majority of viruses in the world infect bacteria.
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It amazes me people don't do basic research. (Score:5, Funny)
Haven't they seen movies?
Don't they know what will happen next? First the base loses radio contact. Then they send a team. Then the outbreak starts and a reporter with the help of the plucky scientist will need to mount magnets on tractors to hem in the mutants.
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And at the end of the movie, you discover that what you've been watching is yet another holodeck simulation gone wrong, and Wesley Crusher saves the day just to annoy us once again.
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>Wesley Crusher
His mom is on the holodeck! He studied all the manuals. How could you not allow a teenager with zero experience to save the captain, his mom, data and some nameless ensign that was shot.
Go with the flow! (Score:4, Interesting)
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Look out the window, the zombie apocalypse is already happening!
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Worse yet, watch C-Span and you'll have all the evidence you could ever want.
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Glaciers flow downwards. That's what they do!
Often. But not guaranteed.
Consider liquid water that reaches the surface as precipitation. Most of it flows downhill to the sea. But not all of it. Some of it gets trapped in lakes. Does a frozen lake flow downhill?
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The vast majority of water loss from glaciers is by melting to water, not evaporation to water vapour. About the only place where sublimation (conversion of water ice directly to water vapour without passing through the water liquid phase) is a significant factor is where the ice is a long way from a slope (in the middle of an icesheet) and never approaches 0degC. That means pretty much only in interior parts of Antarctica.
A century ago Wegener and colle
microscopic organisms per square inch ? (Score:4, Insightful)
How about:; microscopic organisms per cubic inch ?
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Fixated that four you.
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How about:; microscopic organisms per cubic inch ?
Maybe they cut the ice into ultra-thin slices, such that the depth is negligible. It seems pretty likely that's how they actually do the analysis, and counting.
Burning question: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You're thinking of yeast.
Not extinct (Score:5, Informative)
The summary is misleading. It is not that viruses were found that are extinct and no longer exist, but that we simply haven't cataloged a large percentage of viruses (especially outside those that infect humans) in general.
It is not surprising that dozens of these viruses had never been seen before, said Chantal Abergel, a researcher in environmental virology at the French National Centre for Scientific Research.
“We are very far from sampling the entire diversity of viruses on Earth,” she said.
Have not seen anything yet. (Score:2)
So thats where they are stashing them ... (Score:2)
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Better than yellow snow. (Score:2)
Plague Inc. (Score:2)
Great! Plague Inc IRL
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