In Nature in December, a team of researchers at the Department of Energy’s Joint Genome Institute in Walnut Creek, Calif., and colleagues reported one such microbe’s draft genome — put together from DNA acquired from the semifrozen dirt in an Alaskan black spruce forest. The Alaskan microbe carries genes tuned to transform organic matter into methane, a finding that may one day help provide a vivid picture of what will happen as soil conditions change.
Read more on ScienceNews