Scientists from the Institute of Physics, Biology and Problems of Plant Protection of the Russian Academy of Sciences have germinated seeds of a plant that is over 30 thousand years old

The staff of the Soil Cryology Laboratory of the Institute of Physicochemical and Biological Problems of Soil Science of the Russian Academy of Sciences have been studying the cryobiosphere, a poorly studied part of the biosphere, for over 35 years

with negative-temperature ecosystems and extremely low rates of biochemical reactions and biological processes.

In permafrost soils and frozen rocks, conditions are created that ensure the long-term preservation of cellular structures.

This contributes to the preservation of biological systems over geological time incomparably longer than in other habitats.

The cryobiosphere, a repository of ancient biological communities, allows us to observe the result of their cryopreservation over geological time. Viable ecosystems of the cryolithosphere are an independent section of bacterial paleontology, where paleoreconstructions are carried out based on DNA preserved in frozen strata and geobiological clocks are developed that record the duration of the stay of viable organisms outside the active biogeochemical cycle. And finally, the Earth's cryobiosphere is a model of the cosmic habitat on cryogenic planets, and its microbial inhabitants are possible analogues of life on Mars.

In recent years, viable biological objects have been identified in frozen rocks similar to those that form the walls of the Batagay Basin. In the frozen strata of the Arctic, in the cores of boreholes in all polar regions of the Earth with constant negative rock temperatures from -2 to -28 °C, there are numerous and diverse communities of viable paleomicroorganisms: gram-positive and gram-negative, spore-forming and non-spore-forming, anaerobic and aerobic bacteria, fungi, yeast, cyanobacteria, green algae and protozoa. Many of them are represented by new species, and the most ancient ones are dated back approximately 3 million years. When permafrost thaws, micro-organisms completely restore their physiological activity. In 2012, the narrow-leaved campion (Silene stenophylla), an inconspicuous herbaceous plant common in Siberia and the Far East, blossomed at the Institute of Physicochemical and Biological Problems of Soil Science of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Pushchino. This attracted the attention of the entire world. The fact is that the Pushchino campion was born thanks to seeds more than 30 thousand years old.

Russian paleontologists discovered them in the Kolyma River region in the burrows of ancient ground squirrels. The caches were located in untouched permafrost, which indicated the antiquity of the find.

First, the scientists induced cell division and organogenesis in the defrosted seeds, growing flowering plants. They, in turn, after pollination produced normal seeds with almost 100% germination.

Thus, the campion became the oldest restored plant on Earth. The record for germination of historical seeds belongs to a date palm, whose seed was discovered during excavations in Herodium, near the Dead Sea. Its age was estimated at two thousand years, and the tree that grew from the seed can well be considered a witness to the birth of Christianity.

Based on materials from the Kommersant newspaper (https://www.kommersant.ru/doc/3279940) and RIA Novosti (https://ria.ru/20190124/1549795906.html)