Sampling snow covered with ’glacier blood’
Sampling snow covered with 'glacier blood' © Jean-Gabriel VALAY/JARDIN DU LAUTARET/UGA/CNRS High elevation snow is home to previously unknown species of microalgae. Scientists have created the ALPALGA consortium to study this ecosystem, which is threatened by climate change. According to their initial results, these microalgae are tiered to elevation, just like herbaceous plants and trees. The life of the microscopic algae that inhabit snow at high elevations is still relatively unknown. Researchers from the CNRS, CEA, Météo-France, INRAE and the l'Université Grenoble Alpes have therefore created the ALPALGA consortium to study this little-known world, threatened by global warming. Scientists will publish their initial results in Frontiers in Plant Science on 7 June 2021, describing for the first time the distribution of dozens of mountain microalgae species according to elevation. In a white ocean, well above sea level, the algae thrive.
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