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Update 12:05 p.m. 3/13/13 : The modish news reports indicate that the Lake Vostok squad has found DNA indication of a new microbe , and that the Russian researcher who said they had not had not been inform of the latest results and was referring toearlier test that indicated contamination .
Late last hebdomad , a Russian news vent report that scientists at Antarctica ’s Lake Vostok , immerse under miles of ice , tell they had found bacterium that appeared to be unexampled to scientific discipline . Now , the head of that lab has said the touch is actually just contamination , run outside researchers to say that the Russian team rushed too quickly to announce the possibility of new bacterial life .
Russia’s Vostok Station, in a photograph taken during the 2000 to 2001 field season.
Russian news media reported last hebdomad that the squad had found DNA from a bug that did not appear in database and is only86 percent similar to others on Earth — considered a true threshold of fresh life .
On Monday ( March 11 ) , the laboratory analyse the finding said it was not new bacteria that generated the sign , but taint .
" We found sure specimen , although not many . All of them were contamination , " testing ground oral sex Vladimir Korolyov said in a citation assign in sensitive reports to the Interfax news representation .
Russia’s Vostok Station, in a photograph taken during the 2000 to 2001 field season.
The quick backtrack instance the danger of bypassing peer review when announcing new results , Peter Doran , an Arctic and Antarctic researcher at the University of Illinois at Chicago , told OurAmazingPlanet .
' you may say anything you want in a press release '
compeer reviewis the scientific process that all findings must undergo before work is published , generally in the human body of a newspaper in a scientific diary . The research comes under the scrutiny of other scientist in the field and is formalize and question before anything goes to photographic print . That ’s not the case in a news paper .
For that reasonableness , the scientists who OurAmazingPlanet spoke with sound out that it was hard for them to hash out why the Russians bomb since they do not even screw , for good example , what contaminates were found in the lab . That information could take workweek or calendar month to surface .
" you’re able to say anything you want in a insistence liberation , " Doran enounce . " The match review literature [ by dividing line ] is very controlled . It ask to be substantiated , and written in clear speech . "
" I tell my bookman , " he carry on , " do n’t trust anything you read in the popular pressure . Even if there is a paper , there ’s often a gulf between what is in the paper and in the popular press . "
Peer review , however , can take years , acknowledge David Pearce , a researcher with the British Antarctic Survey who work on a similar British travail to drill into buried Lake Ellsworth . ( That feat failedand is being subject to a review board . The results should be issue around May , at which point the British will decide whether to try again . ) [ Extreme Antarctica : Amazing pic of Lake Ellsworth ]
Taxpayers are often raring to find out what is going on , Pearce said , and the press works to fulfil that need . A balance must be struck between these needs , he tot up .
" It ’s important [ the public ] is kept inform of what ’s run on , and the interesting things that are add up out , " Pearce said . Science , by contrast , requires time and careful thought .
" You do require to incur out what ’s happen to the research money , " he added , " but you do n’t want to say too much too before long . "
Sterilization part of best praxis
The Russian researchers not only faced challenges concerning announce their finding , but also scientific challenge in their quest to discover liveliness .
It ’s still not known what kind of life , if any , lies below the 2 international nautical mile ( 3 kilometers ) of ice that sits on top of Lake Vostok . As far as research worker know , the underground freshwater has been lie there untouched for more than a million years .
reassert that any possible signature of life is not a contamination is complicated , to say the least .
There ’s a strict protocol the Americans strive to come in Antarctica , sound out Doran , who is familiar with the practices of the U.S. Whillans Ice Stream Subglacial Access Research Drilling project ( WISSARD ) team that form this year at Antarctica’sLake Whillans .
Doran could not speak specifically to the Russians , but say the American work demonstrates a good methodology .
In WISSARD ’s case , it involve sterilizing all the equipment with hydrogen peroxide gel or a similar product , then hermetically seal them in bags for despatch . scientist on - website sterilize the water in the drill organization through several steps that include filters and biography - killing ultraviolet radiation .
As the drill pass on through the ice , the scientist monitor cell counts to make indisputable there are no unexplained jump .
WISSARD recently announcedlife finding of its own , but Doran was equally skeptical of that until a composition comes out confirming the work . [ Gallery : find oneself Life in a Buried Antarctic Lake ]
To the WISSARD announcement , Doran say , " I understand how it occur . There are plant reporters in the field with them . They are posture around the dinner party board together , and drinking Scotch together , and the newsperson are powerful there [ when scientist say ] ' Our cell count are way up when we ’ve gone into the lake water . ' "
" Of course that gets reported , but without the equal critical review literature , it ’s still a violation of how the standard things are done , " Doran said .
