Climate change is killing soil organisms vital to some of Earth's ecosystems

This "biorust" group of fungi, lichens, mosses, blue-green algae and other microbes retains water and produces nutrients that other organisms can use

As deserts disappear, deserts may expand, says Bettina Weber, an ecologist at the University of Graz

It turned out that the crackling sound came from aggregates of life hundreds of years ago that helped retain only a small amount of water and produced life-sustaining nutrients such as nitrogen and carbon

But in 2013, scientists found that climate change was changingMicrobial compositionBiological rust

The original goal was to monitor the spread of a non-native plant called cheatgrass and its effect on biological rust and other life

The U.

Weather measurements over the past 50 years show the park's temperature has risen by 0.

Almost all lichens are withering, specifically to help convert nitrogen in the air into a form that living organisms can use, Finger Higgins and her team today inProceedings of the National Academy of SciencesIn 1967 and 1996, these nitrogen-fixing lichens accounted for 19% of biological rusts, although this proportion fluctuated from year to year

However, they seem to have been declining recently

A biological rust disease persists, but the number of lichens decreases, so there may be fewer and fewer plants that can survive, leaving more and more bare land

Based on research from her own team, Webb estimates that by 2070, 25 to 40 percent of biological rust will be gone

"Good results have been achieved with cultivation (blue-green algae) and mosses, but still not with lichens," said dryland ecologist Mónica Ladrón de Guevara of the Arid Zone Experimental Station in Almeria,

This may include reducing the use of fossil fuels and carbon dioxide emissions, etc.