Canadian researchers are collecting mud from Frobisher Bay, near Iqaluit, to see if that mud has tiny microbes that could be used in face creams or cancer-fighting drugs.

The research is the latest in aquatic bioprospecting, in which researchers seek marine micro-organisms with "bioactive compounds" that could be added to natural health-care products and cosmetics.

Much of the world's bioprospecting to date has taken place in tropical climates, but there is a growing body of work from northern locations, said Russell Kerr, who is leading the research in Frobisher Bay.

"Going up to the Arctic really represents the next really exciting steps for us," said Kerr, who heads up the University of Prince Edward Island's Marine Natural Products Lab. "Nobody has looked at, certainly, Canada's North in terms of the natural product potential of microbes.

"We view this as the first of a great many trips over the next many, many years to really try to get, initially, an understanding of what microbes are there. And concurrent with that, what sorts of natural products might these microbes be able to produce that could be of value in human health, animal health, cosmetic industry, and so on and so forth."

Kerr said the team will collect Frobisher Bay mud using a device that drops like an anchor and has a scoop at the end.

"It looks like a missile," Kerr said of the device. "It'll be interesting bringing this through customs or at airport security."

Kerr said the scientific community wants to identify some of the microbes in Canada's North soon, before they are threatened by climate change.

While it is rare for aquatic bioprospecting to uncover the next cancer-fighting drug ingredient, Kerr said the research can find bioactive compounds for other health-care products.

Bioprospecting has already raised some concerns among Nunavut's Inuit, who are asking what they could gain from the discovery of microbes in their waters.

"This is not only a social and cultural issue, but it's also an economic development issue for us," said Violet Ford, an Iqaluit-based lawyer and activist who raised the issue at the Inuit Circumpolar Council assembly in Greenland last month.

Kerr said his group would hold the patents for any biological discoveries, as is standard practice, but that he will approach local groups to discuss the potential value of what lies in Frobisher Bay's mud.