To finish up the microbial marvels, I want to go over a couple of cool things about their research. But first let's review the carbon cycle and how humans are impacting it.

    Ice Berg near Adelaide Island
    Don't worry. There is still lots of ice, glaciers and snow down here. Antarctica hasn't melted. This picture was taken near Adelaide Island on our way from Rothera to Palmer Station.

    Graph showing warming trends at Palmer Station
    This graph shows the warming trend down here. It is normal to have lots of ups and downs over the years. But you will notice the overall trend is towards less ice overall. Rothera is a point south of Palmer. That's where a British Station is. If you remember we went down that way on our way here.

    Aerial image of glacial recession at Palmer Station
    Here's another graphic depiction of ice melt. This shows the receding glacier since 1963. So much has melted that a new island was discovered next to Anvers Island which is where Palmer Station is located.

    If you remember the diagram from yesterday, you will notice that the natural flow of carbon exchange is pretty even. For example, the process of photosynthesis takes in about 120 billion metric tons of carbon. At the same time plant respiration releases about 60 billion metric tons of carbon and microbial respiration and decomposition releases about 60 billion metric tons also. So it's an even exchange. But...how much did you notice humans dumping into the atmosphere? Do you see the red 9? That means roughly 9 billion metric tons per year. In the U.S. there are approximately 314 million people. When you look at oil consumption, which is through many, many ways - transport, using materials which used oil to make them, etc., it averages out to 2.5 gallons per person per day. This country emits roughly 5.4 metric tons of carbon per person which totalled comes out to 1.5 gigatons per year. A gigaton is a billion tons. A lot. 16% of global carbon emissions. The excess carbon in the atmosphere is a cause for concern from a number of angles. In terms of marine study - the oceans are a huge carbon sink. We talked about this in an earlier journal. The CO2 enters the water and the chemical reaction creates carbonic acid.

    Back to the research on microbes. I want to introduce you to the flow cytometer. An amazing piece of technology that counts and analyzes individual cells. Remember the gadget that Theresa Grove used that measured the oxygen consumption? Well, the flow cytometer is equally impressive. This counts and sorts cells and detects specific markers that help to identify the cell and the proteins within. It basically suspends a cell in a stream of extremely pure water and passes a laser through it to detect all sorts of physical and chemical characteristics of the cell. And it can analyze thousands of particles in a single second. As you may have guessed, this device is used in health care and disease detection as well.

    Sean O'Neil working on flow cytometer
    Sean hard at work at the flow cytometer. Photo courtesy of Jeremy Rich.

    Madie Willis in the radioactive lab at Palmer Station
    Madie is in the *rad* lab, as in radioactive. She injects a radioactive amino acid, leucine, into the microbe samples and they can trace it's path. As you learned in bio, at least in my class, amino acids make up proteins. So when the flow cytometer is analyzing the proteins in the microbes they wil see if this one has traveled. Did I mention that tomorrow is Madie's birthday? Presumably the glow from her birthday cake will be candles not radioactivity! Photo courtesy of Jeremy Rich.

    Iceberg down in the Antarctic Circle
    We'll end on a good note. This was yet another spectacular iceberg in the Antarctic Circle.

    Author
    Date
    Location
    Palmer Station
    Weather Summary
    Very Cold
    Temperature
    19
    Wind Speed
    14

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