The oceans and its interconnected ecosystems hold a wide array of potential bioactive compounds provided by unique species from the ocean’s depths and sea breeze, to the marine cnidarians and onshore microbiome halophyte plants. An estimate of only a 5% of the ocean has been explored. Among them the Arctic is one of the oceans with the most un- tapped potential for the discovery of extraordinary marine mi- croorganisms, with novel applications in biotechnological elds like medicine or cosmetics.
In search of new active ingredients, recently a research vessel in collaboration with different institutes, carried out an Arctic scienti c expedition through the North Atlantic and Arctic Basin. Near Greenland Arctic waters, a seawater sample was collected at 2,700 m depth and 2.98oC, in which a Pseudoalteromonas sp. strain was isolated and afterwards characterized. This Pseudoalteromonas sp. secretes polysac- charides (exopolysaccharides) and proteoglycans with varied and characteristic chemical properties, to protect themselves from external aggressions, such as high salinity, low tem- perature and high pressure, among others. In fact, exopolysaccharides (EPS) may have a lm-forming ability, which are a high demand in the cosmetic market.
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