"Strangers" have been freezing high in the mountains for the last 15 thousand years.
Viruses fell prey to an expedition of Chinese and American scientists back in 2015. But only recently it became clear what was actually found. As reported by the portal LiveScience with a link to the bioRxiv preprint library.
Scientists have extracted cores from wells on the Guliya Glacier, located high in the mountains of Tibet - they got them from a depth of about 50 meters. Ice formed there about 15 thousand years ago.
The cores were stored in a refrigerator, recently they were finally thawed and, using a special technique, they extracted the viruses that were frozen there. Viruses were found to be 33 different types. Of these, 28 have never been seen before. Most - 18 species - infect bacteria. What the rest are capable of is still unknown.
Scientists reassure: their findings are not dangerous, since viruses extracted from the glacier are represented mainly by DNA. And DNA supposedly cannot infect.
I would like to believe. And hope that the ancient genetic material, through an oversight, will not be incorporated somewhere into a more modern one and will not turn some not yet the most dangerous virus into a deadly one.
Glaciers are melting - viruses are scattering around the world.
Well-preserved viruses can also be hidden in glaciers - in permafrost, for example, they have already been found. While harmless for people and animals. But suddenly, among the now frozen and sleeping there are pathogens of terrible diseases? Unknown destructive pathogens are infectious agents, in scientific terms. They may well get into the environment - after all, glaciers and permafrost are now actively melting as a result of climate change. Scientists do not exclude such troubles.
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Recently, there are enough examples of epidemics appearing from nowhere.
VLADIMIR LAGOVSKY