Directory

Start date:
2010
End date:
2010
Locations:
Battleship Promontory, Beacon Valley, Lakes Bonney and Fryxell, Miers Valley
Principle Investigator:
Dr. John Barrett
Organisation:
Virginia Tech
Our objective is to investigate the composition and activity of microbial communities across a range of soil conditions, e.g., where water, organic matter, and geochemistry vary over local to regional scales in the Transantarctic Mountains, in order to assess controls over microbial biogeography. The proposed research targets two areas in the Transantarctic Mountains, the McMurdo Dry Valleys and the Central
Transantarctic region further south, which represents a novel and extreme soil environment relative to current understanding of the ecology of extreme terrestrial ecosystems. Researchers will exercise an integrated approach to investigate relationships between variation in soil habitats (i.e., climate and
geochemistry) and biodiversity using a combination of molecular techniques and in situ assessment of biological activity in a quantitative biogeographical framework that will enable them to distinguish fine versus broad scale controls over microbial communities.