  Some microbes appear to be able to metabolize in glacial ice or permafrost.
The rate depends on temperature, nutrient level, and bioelement availability,
among other factors. I have developed a plausible argument that they do this
while confined in veins filled with acidic or saline solution that provides
nutrients and elements necessary for growth. Here I develop this scenario
further and discuss some of its implications for ice-covered planetary bodies
and for the the origin of life. An accompanying paper in the conference
proceedings (Bay et al.) discusses plans to test this hypothesis using
epifluorescence microscopy of pristine, unmelted ice samples and an optical
biospectrologging tool to assay living and dead microbes in boreholes in
glacial ice.
