Tuesday, March 20, 2012

Seed endurance


Ancient flower blooms again

Fruit frozen underground for more than 31,000 years produce plants

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Scientists grew this flower from fruit that had been frozen underground for more than 31,000 years. Credit: PNAS Permission granted from PNAS
Imagine putting a seed in a freezer, waiting 30,000 years, and then taking the seed out and planting it. Do you think a flower would grow?
Amazingly, scientists have just managed to do something very similar. They found the fruit of an ancient plant that had been frozen underground in Siberia — a region covering central and eastern Russia — for about 31,800 years. Using pieces of the fruit, the scientists grew plants in a lab. The new blooms have delicate white petals. They are also the oldest flowering plants that researchers have ever revived from a deep freeze.
“This is like regenerating a dinosaur from tissues of an ancient egg,” University of California, Los Angeles biologist Jane Shen-Miller told Science News./.../

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