Bacterial Activity in South Pole Snow Is Questionable

Bacterial activity in South pole snow is questionable.

Bacterial activity in South Pole snow.

Large populations (200 to 5,000 cells ml(-1) in snowmelt) of bacteria were present in surface snow and firn from the south pole sampled in January 1999 and 2000. DNA isolated from this snow yielded ribosomal DNA sequences similar to those of several psychrophilic bacteria and a bacterium which aligns closely with members of the genus Deinococcus, an ionizing-radiation- and desiccation-resistant...

Formaldehyde and hydrogen peroxide in air, snow and interstitial air at South Pole

Average H2O2 (HCHO) mixing ratios measured above the snowpack at South Pole (SP) were 278 pptv (103 pptv) in December 2000 and between 4 and 43 times (1.4–2.6 times) the value estimated from gas-phase photostationary state (PSS) model calculations. The larger difference is realized if dry deposition of both species is included in the model. H2O2 and HCHO fluxes from the snowpack were independen...

Temperatures, heating rates and vapour pressures in near-surface snow at the South Pole

A finite-volume model is used to simulate 9 years (1995–2003) of snow temperatures at the South Pole. The upper boundary condition is skin-surface temperature derived from routine upwelling longwave radiation measurements, while the lower boundary condition is set to the seasonal temperature gradient at 6.5m depth, taken from prior measurements at the South Pole. We focus on statistics of tempe...

Bacterial sporulation: Pole-to-pole protein oscillation

Sporulating bacteria need to temporally coordinate DNA replication, chromosome partitioning and sporulation initiation. Recent work has shown that one aspect of this coordination lies with the interdependent subcellular localization of two proteins, Spo0J and Soj, and in the Spo0J-dependent spatial oscillation of Soj.