The oldest living organisms on Earth: They're back! Frozen worms after 42,000 years live and eat

The two worms that were frozen in the permafrost 42,000 years ago have returned to life, and are now considered the oldest living beings on the planet, which is described as great scientific progress

Ancient nematodes are again "moving and eating" for the first time after the Pleistocene age, after returning to life in Petri's pelvis, according to a new study by a Russian team of scientists in collaboration with Princeton University. "We obtained the first data showing the ability of multi-organisms for long-term cryobiosis in Arctic permafrost"

- wrote the authors of the study.

Approximately 300 prehistoric worms were thawed out in the laboratory of the Institute of Physico-Chemical and Biological Problems of Soil Science in Moscow and analyzed as part of the study. Since then, the two females "have shown signs of life" in the small but new-age victory of the involved researchers. "Our data show the ability of multi-organisms to survive long-term (tens of thousands of years) of cryobiosis under natural cryoconervative conditions," said scientists who were involved in a study for the Siberian Times.

"It is obvious that this ability suggests that Pleistocene nematodes have some flexible mechanisms that can be of scientific and practical importance to related fields of science, such as cryomedicine, cryobiology and astrobiology." Both worms come from two areas in Yakutia, the coldest region in Russia . One, believed to be about 32,000 years old, was in a squirrel in a rock of Permafro near the Pleistocene Park. Another worm, about 47,000 years old, was found in permafrost near the Alazeya River in 2015.

• 27 Jul, 2018
• 2496 views