Thanks for sharing @ipbes

Svalbard is one of my favourite places in the world. I was lucky enough to visit twice doing research on #glacier #cryoconite #microbialecology in Ny Alesund - the most memorable #fieldwork I've ever experienced and a wonderful international #science community to live in.

As a way of extending an #introduction to the #science I have most fun doing, I'll do a few tweets on different areas of our #research.

We are excited to be in a team led by UNIS Svalbard: The BIOICE project explores #cryoconite on glaciers in #Antarctica.

There, it's so cold, these pothole-like #ecosystems are sealed by ice lids for years/decades. But, there are millions of #microbes trapped inside these icy greenhouses, and they form the southerly limit of photosynthesis on Earth.

As a way of extending an #introduction to the science I have most fun doing, I'll do a few tweets on different areas of our #research.

Firstly - #cryoconite on #glaciers is dark granules of dust bundled by #cyanobacteria, forming pot-hole like ecosystems. I'm a career-long cryoconite nerd.

One of our papers shows how the cryoconite microbiome is stabilised at optimal levels of primary production by 3D reshaping of the physical #ecosystem on #Greenland's ice.

Paper: https://sfamjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1462-2920.13349

As an #introduction - Hi, I’m Arwyn. I’m a Reader in Biosciences at #Aberystwyth University in #Cymru. I’m a research led teacher in #microbiology working on how the diversity, interactions, dispersal and functions of #microbes intersect with planet scaled problems. Mostly #Arctic change but spent the last years in pandemic response for institution & government. I like #cryoconite, #nanopore sequencing, and kitkats. Not necessarily in that order.