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.2019 Aug 14;7(8):260.
doi: 10.3390/microorganisms7080260.

Should We Not Further Study the Impact of Microbial Activity on Snow and Polar Atmospheric Chemistry?

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Should We Not Further Study the Impact of Microbial Activity on Snow and Polar Atmospheric Chemistry?

Florent Domine. Microorganisms..

Abstract

Since 1999, atmospheric and snow chemists have shown that snow is a very active photochemical reactor that releases reactive gaseous species to the atmosphere including nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons, aldehydes, halocarbons, carboxylic acids and mercury. Snow photochemistry therefore affects the formation of ozone, a potent greenhouse gas, and of aerosols, which affect the radiative budget of the planet and, therefore, its climate. In parallel, microbiologists have investigated microbes in snow, identified and quantified species, and sometimes discussed their nutrient supplies and metabolism, implicitly acknowledging that microbes could modify snow chemical composition. However, it is only in the past 10 years that a small number of studies have revealed that microbial activity in cold snow (< 0 °C, in the absence of significant amounts of liquid water) could lead to the release of nitrogen oxides, halocarbons, and mercury into the atmosphere. I argue here that microbes may have a significant effect on snow and atmospheric composition, especially during the polar night when photochemistry is shut off. Collaborative studies between microbiologists and snow and atmospheric chemists are needed to investigate this little-explored field.

Keywords: atmosphere; chemistry; climate; microbes; snow.

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Conflict of interest statement

The author declares no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Selected observed and hypothetical modifications in snow and atmospheric composition due to photochemistry (red arrows) and microbial metabolism (blue arrows). Photochemical reactions photolyze the nitrate ion, producing NO, NO2, and HONO. Secondary chemistry produces OH, which can oxidize organics present on organic particles [7]. This chemistry releases NO, NO2, HONO, HCHO, and other organics to the atmosphere [18,28]. HCHO can form a solid solution with ice [34], thus becoming incorporated within snow crystals. Photochemistry reduces HgII to Hg0, which is released to the atmosphere [17]. Gammaproteobacteria also reduce HgII to Hg0 [16]. The nitrifying bacteriumNitrosomonas produces NO2− from NH4+ contained in clay mineral particles deposited onto snow by wind. Under suitable pH conditions (snow is often acidic), NO2− can be released to the atmosphere as HONO. The denitrifying bacteriumPseudomonas stutzeri produces NO from NO2− [6].Nitrosomonas can also denitrify and produce NO. NO can be oxidized to NO2 by atmospheric ozone. As suspected from ice core analyses [35], bacteria embedded within the ice lattice may also metabolize molecules that diffuse in ice and I speculatively represent here the consumption of HCHO byMethylobacterium [36].
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