WONDEROUS FROST FLOWERS HOLD CLUES TO THE ORIGINS OF LIFE

In the Arctic and Antarctica, flowers bloom in winter! They are like magic in many ways -- from their mysterious ephemeral physical beauty to the fact that they hold some secrets to the origin of life itself, according to recent studies.

Back in 2009, Jeff Bowman, a graduate student at the University of Washington, and his colleague Matthias Wietz, discovered frost flowers on an Arctic adventure.

Made of ice crystals that have risen up through the frozen surface of the Arctic Ocean, these delicate flower-shaped forms begin to grow in winter, when the air is at least 15 degrees cooler than the ice.

The frost flowers start at imperfections or cracks in the ice surface where the air begins to saturate with escaping water vapor and begins to freeze. They grow vertically, as the process continues, up to a few centimeters high.

As the crystals form, salt begins to flow from the water into the frost. The frost flowers end up with almost 3 times more salinity than the sea. And, as a result, they are cooler than normal ice.

Bowman went on to study frost flowers at the University of Washington leading a graduate research team along with oceanography professor Jody Deming. They were interested in not only understanding how frost flowers form, but also to see if they contained any lifeforms.

Their study combined oceanography, microbiology, and planetary sciences in the central Arctic Ocean as part of the Integrated Graduate Education and Research Training (IGERT) program.

They collected frost flowers that were floating on the Beaufort Sea near Barrow, Alaska, floating on the Beaufort Sea. And, indeed, they found traces of microscopic life inside the crystals. In fact, they found that there were twice as many microbes inside the frost flowers than there were in the sea water.

The discovery of these psychrophiles (cold-loving microorganisms) is particularly important because the flowers are the coldest place where life has been found on earth, as they form amid extreme sub-zero temperatures nearing -22C (-7.6F). They found that each flower is essentially a temporary ecosystem.

The hollow frost flowers “petals” wick moisture from the ice surface, incorporating salt, marine bacteria, and other substances as they grow. Once the Arctic sun lights their surface, a series of chemical reactions take place which produce formaldehyde, deplete ozone, and alter the chemical composition of the lower atmosphere.

Formaldehyde can convert to simple sugars that are the building blocks of RNA. So, it is possible that frost flowers can give us more clues about the very origin of life on this planet -- and possibly other planets. Jupiter’s moon Europa, with its frozen ocean surface, might host life-filled frost flowers, as might  Saturn’s moon Enceladus, for example.

Bowman now heads up the Bowman Lab in the Integrative Oceanography Division at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, which continues to explore many aspects of marine microbial ecology and is growing frost flowers in the lab.  Matthias Wietz now conducts related research at the Institute for Chemistry and Biology of the Marine Environment at the University of Oldenburg, Germany.

Read more about Beautiful Winter Wonders in Real Surreal Winter.

And check out more beautiful things happening now in BN Arts/Design, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact Daily Fix posts.

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IMAGE CREDITS:

1. Image: by Jeff Wallace. “Frost Flowers.”
2. Image: by Matthias Wietz. “Frost Flowers.”
3. Image: by Matthias Wietz. “Frost flowers.”
4. Image: by Matthias Wietz. “Frost flowers.”
5. Image: by Matthias Wietz. “Frost Flowers.”
6. Image: by Matthias Wietz. "Frost Flowers."
7. Image: Matthias Wietz. “Frost Flowers.”
8. Image: Matthias Wietz. “Frost Flowers.”
9. Image: by Matthias Wietz. “Frost Flowers.”
10. Image: Courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech. View from Europa’s Surface.
11. Image: Courtesy of Bowman Lab in the Integrative Oceanography Division at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Laboratory grown frost flower.
12. Image by Johannes Zielcke. “Frost Flowers.”
13. Image: by Lisa Plourde. “Frost flowers on Maidstone Lake.”
14. Image: by BN App - Download now!
15. Image: by Mirjam Sophia Glessmer. “Frost Flowers.”