Plant blooms after 30,000 years in permafrost

[Enmos]

"Biologists have resurrected a 30,000-year-old plant, cultivating it from fruit tissue recovered from frozen sediment in Siberia. The plant is by far the oldest to be brought back from the dead: the previous record holder was a sacred lotus, dating back about 1200 years.

The late David Gilichinsky from the Soil Cryology Laboratory in Moscow, Russia, and colleagues recovered the fruits of the ice age flowering plant (Silene stenophylla) from a fossilised squirrel burrow in frozen sediments near the Kolyma river in north-east Siberia. Radiocarbon dating of the fruit suggests the squirrel stashed it around 31,800 years ago, just before the ice rolled in."

Amazing! Just wanted to share.
The second link (below), especially, contains more information + images.


Sources:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn21498-plant-blooms-after-30000-years-in-permafrost.html
http://tommytoy.typepad.com/tommy-t...rozen-fruits-buried-by-ancient-squirrels.html

 

[cosmictraveler]

I can't even get my petunias to grow today!:bugeye:

 

[scheherazade]

Fascinating post, Enmos.

I am a gardener and I store my seeds double packaged in plastic in the crisper of my fridge and I attain higher germination rates with seeds that are 6-12 years old than shows on their original packaging and germination testing. Go figure, lol...

31,800 years in cold storage does rather boggle the mind.

It appears that we have only begun to scratch the surface of all that there is to learn.