Life in Extreme Environments: Insights in Biological Capability

Description

From deep ocean trenches and the geographical poles to outer space, organisms can be found living in remarkably extreme conditions. This book provides a captivating account of these systems and their extraordinary inhabitants, 'extremophiles'. A diverse, multidisciplinary group of experts discuss responses and adaptations to change; biodiversity, bioenergetic processes, and biotic and abiotic interactions; polar environments; and life and habitability, including searching for biosignatures in the extraterrestrial environment. The editors emphasize that understanding these systems is important for increasing our knowledge and utilizing their potential, but this remains an understudied area. Given the threat to these environments and their biota caused by climate change and human impact, this timely book also addresses the urgency to document these systems. It will help graduate students and researchers in conservation, marine biology, evolutionary biology, environmental change and astrobiology better understand how life exists in these environments and their susceptibility or resilience to change.

Guido di Prisco was Professor of Biochemistry and CNR (National Research Council) Research Associate, Institute of Biosciences and Bioresources, Naples, Italy. He was the CNR Research Director up until his retirement in 2004. He took part in numerous expeditions in both the Antarctic and Arctic. On September 29 2019, Guido passed away after a serious illness. Howell Edwards is Emeritus Professor of Molecular Spectroscopy, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Bradford. He is a member of the International Science Team on the RLS Raman instrument for the ExoMars 2020 mission. He has published over 1300 papers on Raman spectroscopy and its applications. Josef Elster is Professor in the Centre for Polar Ecology, Faculty of Science, University of South Bohemia, Ceske Budejovice, and senior scientist, Phycology Centre, Institute of Botany, Academy of Science of the Czech Republic, Trebon, Czech Republic. His expertise is in the field and laboratory study of polar cyanobacteria and microalgae. He has led or been a member of many polar research expeditions and was founder of the Czech Arctic Research Infrastructure 'Josef Svoboda Station', Svalbard. Ad H. L. Huiskes is a guest scientist at the Netherlands Institute of Sea Research (NIOZ), Yerseke, Netherlands. He led the Unit of Polar Ecology at the Netherlands Institute of Ecology, Yerseke, was acting Director of the Centre of Estuarine and Marine Ecology (now a division of NIOZ), and subsequently acting Director of the Yerseke branch of NIOZ. In addition, he was Vice President of the Scientific Committee for Antarctic Research (SCAR, 2008-2012) and Lecturer of Polar Ecology at the University of Groningen.

'... the volume establishes a baseline for this new field of study in which the relevant environments have only recently become accessible but face significant threats from climate change and human actions.' L. S. Zipp, Choice '... the volume is interesting, stimulating, and thought-provoking. It points toward many important and potentially useful directions for both basic and applied research. The technical level at which most chapters are written will probably limit their accessibility to general audiences. The two chapters on astrobiology will appeal to anyone interested in space exploration.' Malcolm S. Gordon, The Quarterly Review of Biology