The oldest plant to be regenerated has been grown from 32,000-year-old seeds, beating the previous record holder by 30,000 years.
Russian scientists discovered seeds of Silene Stenophylla, a flowering plant in Siberia. An Ice Age squirrel buried the seeds in the permafrost near the banks of the Kolyma River.
Radiocarbon dating confirmed they were 32,000 years old. Layers of mammoth, bison, and woolly rhinoceros bones surrounded them. The squirrel damaged some of the seeds, but some were viable.
After a year, they got them to flower and create their own seeds.
The new study suggests that permafrost could be a “depository for an ancient gene pool,” where any number of now-extinct species could be found and resurrected, experts say.
The oldest seed brought back before this was a 2,000-year-old palm.
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