Melting ice in the Arctic could unleash 100,000 TONNES of pathogens, study warns

While it’s widely believed the virus behind the Covid-19 pandemic came from an animal, a new study has warned that the next pandemic could come from a glacier.

Researchers have warned that more than 100,000 tonnes of microbes could be released as the world’s glaciers melt.

This includes both potentially harmful and beneficial ones, according to the team from Aberystwyth University.

In their study, the researchers examined surface meltwaters from eight glaciers across Europe and North America, and two sites in western Greenland.

Using a climate model, the researchers estimated what the impact of a moderate rise in carbon emissions would be.

Their results revealed that more than 100,000 tonnes of microbes could be released from the glaciers and enter the wider environment.

For context, that’s the equivalent to an average of 0.65 million tonnes per year of microbes entering rivers, lakes, fjords and oceans across the northern hemisphere over the next 80 years.

Dr Tristram Irvine-Fynn from Aberystwyth University said: ‘Melting glacier ice surfaces host active microbial communities that contribute to melting and biogeochemical cycling, and nourish downstream ecosystems; but these communities remain poorly understood.

‘Over the coming decades, the forecast ‘peak water’ from Earth’s mountain glaciers means we need to improve our understanding of the state and fate of ecosystems on the surface of glaciers.

‘With a better grasp of that picture, we could better predict the effects of climate change on glacial surfaces and catchment biogeochemistry.’

Worryingly, the researchers say the impact of further glacial melting may be ‘significant’.

‘These important findings build on much of our previous research here in Aberystwyth,’ Dr Arwyn Edwards from Aberystwyth University added.

‘The number of microbes released depends closely on how quickly the glaciers melt, and therefore how much we continue to warm the planet.

‘But the mass of microbes released is vast even with moderate warming.

‘While these microbes fertilize downstream environments, some of them might be harmful as well.’

The study comes shortly after researchers from the Finnish Meteorological Institute in Helsinki found that the Arctic is warming nearly four times faster than the Earth’s average. 

Researchers analysed multiple datasets from the likes of NASA and the Met Office about Arctic Circle temperatures between 1979 and 2021. 

They found a large proportion of the Arctic Ocean warmed at a rate of 1.35°F (0.75°C) per decade during this period, nearly four times faster than the global average. 

Previous studies report that the Arctic is warming either twice, more than twice or three times as fast as the globe on average. 

These estimates have generally been reported in the literature and in the media, but they are ‘significant underestimations’, even though they’re based on ‘state-of-the-art’ computer models, the authors say. 

Temperatures are warming faster in the Arctic than the rest of the world largely because of the loss of sea ice.

When bright and reflective ice melts, it gives way to a darker ocean. This amplifies the warming trend because the ocean surface absorbs more heat from the sun than the surface of snow and ice.