An international team of leading scientists has revived a Nematode. Also called a roundworm, Nematode is one of the most prolific animals on Earth, occurring in a wide range of environments, from water to soil and as parasites in animals and plants.
The creature was revived after being frozen in permafrost 46,000 years ago and was found near the Kolyma River in Siberia. The creature’s age was determined by radiocarbon dating.
The creature was in a state of cryptobiosis, where it halts its metabolism to cope with unfavourable conditions. Scientists were able to revive it by gently thawing the worm, which was in the unique metabolic state between death and life.
What Can We Learn From This?
“The major take-home message or summary of this discovery is that it is, in principle, possible to stop life for more or less an indefinite time and then restart it,” Dr. Teymuras Kurzchalia, one of the researchers who revived the Nematode, told The New York Times.
This has some intriguing possibilities, but is mainly a breakthrough for the study of cryptobiosis, defined as a physiological state in which metabolic activity is reduced to an undetectable level without disappearing altogether.
Although there is no direct practical application for cryptobiosis just yet, as with many branches of science, this important find could one day be part of a breakthrough in technology.
For example, it could lead to new methods of the long-term storage of cells and tissues.
Related Articles: 50,000 Years Later: Ancient ‘Zombie Viruses’ Resurface in Melting Arctic | Could the Rate at Which Glaciers Are Melting Cause the Next Pandemic?
It also seems that the findings can lead to a greater understanding in other areas, such as protecting important species from harsh conditions.
Philipp Schiffer, Research Group Leader at the Institute of Zoology at the University of Cologne and one of the scientists behind the study, said:
“By looking at and analysing these animals, we can maybe inform conservation biology, or maybe even develop efforts to protect other species, or at least learn what to do to protect them in these extreme conditions that we have now.”
The question must also be asked if other species from the time period could potentially be brought back, like the Woolly Mammoth, who also lived at that time period, and who has well-documented fossils.
Many scientists, however, are sceptical about the risks of doing this.
A report from the University of Queensland provides a strict warning against any such attempts, saying that “[r]esurrecting extinct species might come at a terrible cost” and listing problems such as loss of biodiversity and a strain on the already difficult conservation budgets.
Whatever ethical questions and possibilities arise from the find, it can clearly be seen as an amazing breakthrough in the study of life on Earth.
Editor’s Note: The opinions expressed here by Impakter.com columnists are their own, not those of Impakter.com — Featured Photo: North central Siberia, March 5, 2012. Featured Photo Credits: Wikimedia Commons.
