Life Beneath the Ice

In 2012, a team of Russian scientists led by Svetlana Yashina made a discovery that stunned the botanical world. Buried in the Siberian permafrost — frozen for roughly 32,000 years — were the preserved fruits of a narrow-leafed campion plant called Silene stenophylla. The seeds had been sealed underground since the last Ice Age, stored in an ancient squirrel burrow by an animal that never came back for them.

The scientists carefully extracted the material and placed it in growing conditions.

Against every reasonable expectation, the plants germinated. They grew. They flowered.

Thirty-two thousand years beneath the ice, and life was still waiting.