There Are Giant Viruses on Ice Sheet’s Surface in the Arctic—But That’s a Good Thing
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Rapid ice melt in the Arctic is one of the most devastating consequences of climate change—both for the Arctic ecosystem as well as sea level rise around the world.
A new study focused on giant viruses that reside on the Greenland ice sheet’s surface details how these large viruses (at least, large compared to other viruses) could help keep algae blooms in check, which slows down the process of ice melt.
The researchers of the study are only beginning to understand the role these giant viruses have on their icy ecosystems.
Every summer, giant viruses awaken across the Greenland ice sheet—and while that sounds like the perfect preamble to a horror film, these viruses aren’t some ancient malady (or long-frozen alien, if you’re particularly creative) ready to lay waste to the world. Instead, they could be a powerful and natural ally against rampant ice melt in the Arctic.
In a new study, published in the journal Microbiome, scientists from Aarhus University in Denmark detailed the presence of giant viruses—specifically nucleocytoplasmic large DNA viruses (NCLDV) supergroup (phylum Nucleocytoviricota)—that exist throughout the Greenland ice sheet.
True to their name, these viruses are big... at least, relatively speaking. While you can’t see them with the naked eye, they are larger that even most bacteria at some 2.5 micrometers. At that size, giant viruses are roughly 125 times bigger than a normal virus. At that “giant” descriptor isn’t limited to just its size—these viruses also have roughly 2.5 million letters in their genome. Bacteria, by comparison, usually have only 150,000 to 200,000.
However, more important than the size of these viruses is their appetites, as they tend to infect algae whose blooms blacken parts of the Greenland ice sheet in the summer months. These blackened areas diminish the ice’s ability to reflect sunlight, which exacerbates melting.
“We don’t know a lot about the viruses, but I think they could be useful as a way of alleviating ice melting caused by algal blooms,” Laura Perini, a postdoctoral student and co-author of the study, said in a press statement. “How specific they are and how efficient it would be, we do not know yet. But by exploring them further, we hope to answer some of those questions.”
Scientists have only known about giant virus for roughly 40 years—the first examples were discovered in the ocean in 1981. Since then, they’ve been found in a variety of different environments (including the human body), but have never been identified or studied on an ice sheet before. Perini said she still hasn’t seen the viruses under a microscope, but knows they’re on the ice sheet by analyzing all the DNA from samples and finding sequences that belong to giant viruses.
The knowledge of this algae-fighting giant virus comes at a pivotal moment, as evidence shows that the Arctic has been warming four times faster than other parts of the world. Discovering natural ways to combat that warming could be beneficial to slowing down ice melt as the world warms. For now, Perini and her team will continue investigating these giant viruses and attempting to understand the roles they play in their not-so-barren icy environment.
“Which hosts the giant viruses infect, we can’t link exactly. Some of them may be infecting protists while others attack the snow algae. We simply can’t be sure yet,” Perini said in the a press statement. “We keep studying the giant viruses to learn more about their interactions and what exactly is their role in the ecosystem.”
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