Cold-adapted yeasts in antarctic deserts

Antarctica is a large continent and as such has a variety of soil habitats ranging from relatively warm, moist, and high in organic carbon content, found on the Antarctic Peninsula, through the cold arid oligotrophic dry valleys. Efforts to identify yeasts from Antarctica were spurred by the development of research stations initiated during the International Geophysical Year (IGY) (1957-1958). The combination of cold, dry, oligotrophic, and high UV conditions makes the Antarctic deserts a challenging place to live. The majority of yeast species found in the Antarctic deserts are from the genera of Cryptococcus and Rhodotorula. Adaptations of yeasts to the Antarctic soil habitat include psychrophily, alteration of sterols, ability to withstand desiccation as well as the ability to successfully scavenge minerals in an oligotrophic habitat. New techniques such as high throughput sequencing and advances in mass spectrometry-based metabolomics research offer the opportunity to further explore how yeasts at the edges of life function.