1,700 mysterious viruses discovered in melting ice glacier

Scientists have uncovered 1,700 viruses from hundreds of metre-long ice cores in the Himalayas.

Back in 2015, a group of experts visited Guliya Glacier on the Tibetan Plateau to analyse ice cores and were stunned to find variations of viruses trapped inside that were unknown to science.

The first part of their study consisted of extracting the ice core, which included cattle and local yak wranglers to carry the heavy cores. Then, they used a special machine to drill 300 metres into the ice, exposing 41,000 years of history. The ice cores were taken back to the lab using different modes of transport including yaks, by air and freezer vans.

"We all think of glacial meltwater as being as pure as our bottled water," Matthew Sullivan, a virologist at the University of Ohio, said.

"We had to have ultra-clean sample handling procedures and then ultra-clean molecular biological processing to get to nucleic acids that could be sequenced."

Once inside the cores, scientists discovered a staggering amount of viral species spanning nine time periods. Almost all (97 per cent) of them were completely new to science, with ZhiPing Zhong, study author and paleoclimatologist at Ohio State University commenting: "These time horizons span three major cold-to-warm cycles, providing a unique opportunity to observe how viral communities have changed in response to different climatic conditions."

"By studying these ancient viruses, we gain valuable insights into viral response to past climate changes, which could enhance our understanding of viral adaptation in the context of ongoing global climate change."

The team has since disclosed that more research is needed to investigate how and if the viruses affected the environment over time.

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