In Search of Metalloid-Resistant Microbes in Antarctica

摘要

In furtherance of a decade-long collaboration with Chilean biochemists and microbiologists, Dr. Tom Chasteen, analytical environmental chemist, travelled to Antarctica to sample environments which might contain bacteria resistant to toxic metals and metalloids. With a Chilean doctoral student name Juan Pablo Monras and travelling via airplane, Chilean naval frigate, zodiacs, and foot, Chasteen helped collect water, soils, and sediments during an excursion in Antarctica's South Shetland Islands and on the Antarctic Peninsula. The trip began in the late austral summer and lasted 15 days (February 19 through March 5), originating in the Chilean gateway to Antarctica, Punta Arenas, on the shores of the Strait of Magellan. The samples they collected in Antarctica will be examined for bacteria that can biologically produce nanoparticles, which are small, fluorescent, so-called quantum dots that can be used in biomedical, pharmaceutical, energy, and catalytic applications. Promising microbes that are isolated at the University of Chile and Andres Bello University in Santiago, will be brought to Chasteen's lab in Texas for analysis by gas chromatography with fluorine-induced chemiluminescence detection.