Eric Collins is an Assistant Professor of Biological Oceanography at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where he primarily studies the distribution and adaptation of microorganisms in the cryosphere. Using barcoding surveys, complete genome sequences, and various ‘omics’, the Cryomics Lab has initiated investigations of microbial diversity and evolution in polar seawater, sea ice, lake ice, snow, and glacier microbiota in Alaska, Canada, Greenland, and Svalbard. As part of the Chief Scientist Training Cruise off the coast of San Diego, Eric is understandably disappointed at the lack of natural ice, but excited by the challenge, which he will overcome by creating artificial sea ice in the freezer. Using this ice he will test hypotheses about the existential nature of “sea ice microbes”, their entrainment into sea ice, and their ultimate fate in a quickly-warming global ocean. More information about Eric and the Cryomics Lab can be found at his website, http://cryomics.org