Research network for permafrost microbiology

Topics and Issues

We identified the following issues to be most relevant to this workshop, but would welcome
your suggestions for additional topics:

• Microbial diversity and biogeography of permafrost environments
  
• Metabolic activity at subzero temperature
• Mechanisms of microbial adaptation and survival in permafrost environments
  
• Permafrost astrobiology
• Plant-microbe interaction
• Microbial communities and global change
• Carbon and nitrogen turnover
• Microbial gene pool of cold environments
• Biotechnology
• Data management and feed into global microbiological databases

In addition to these topics of discussion, the workshop will focus on defining a workplan for MicroPerm driven by science questions and heavily relying on international collaboration. To do so, the workshop will be divided in working groups focusing on the following issues:

• The active layer and beyond: What depths are most relevant to investigate microbiological metabolism, function and community structure?
• In what way can the MicroPerm project provide a platform to integrate knowledge on microorganisms?
• What framework can the MicroPerm project propose to ensure that field studies are undertaken in a consistent manner at site level?
  

For more information we refer you to the attached pdf file 'First Circular Permafrost' and the project website at http://www.microperm.org