Frozen during an ice age 42,000 years worms have been brought back to life by scientists, fuelling hope for human cryogenic freezing
- Two nematodes were found lying dormant in the ancient Pleistocene Age ice
- They lived at the time of woolly mammoths and have since been dormant
- The worms came back to life in a Petri dish after being awoken in a laboratory
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The ancient roundworms – frozen since the era of woolly mammoths – started wriggling again in Petri dishes at a Russian institute The nematodes were coaxed back to life in a Petri dishes in a laboratory at the Institute of Physico-Chemical and Biological Problems of Soil Science, near Moscow. Russian researchers team worked with geoscientists from Princeton University, New Jersey, USA to analyse more than 300 frozen worms to find suitable candidates. According to researchers, only two ‘were shown to contain viable nematodes’. One of these was found in permafrost near the Alazeya River back in 2015, and believed to be around 41,700 years old. The other was taken in 2002 from an prehistoric squirrel burrow in Duvanny Yar outcrop in the lower reaches of the Kolyma River, and is around 32,000 years old. This location is close to the site of Pleistocene Park, an experimental project seeking to recreate the Arctic habitat of the extinct woolly mammoth. Both sites are in Yakutia, which is renown for being the coldest region of Russia.
The worms were coaxed back to life in Petri dishes in a laboratory at the Institute of Physico-Chemical and Biological Problems of Soil Science near Moscow. The breakthrough demonstrates the ability of multicellular organisms to survive long-term
Both specimens were found in the Yakutia region of Siberia, which is known to be the coldest region of the country
‘After being defrosted, the nematodes
showed signs of life – they started moving and eating,’ said another
report on the findings cited by The Siberian Times.
According to the international team of
researchers, this latest breakthrough demonstrates ‘the ability of
multicellular organisms to survive long-term – tens of thousands of
years’ in a state of ‘natural cryoconservation.’
‘It is obvious that this ability suggests
that the Pleistocene nematodes have some adaptive mechanisms that may be
of scientific and practical importance for the related fields of
science, such as cryomedicine, cryobiology, and astrobiology,’ the
researchers wrote in the report, published in journal Doklady Biological
Sciences.
One of the worms was from a site near the Alazeya River (pictured),
found in permafrost in 2015, and believed to be some 41,700 years old
A second worm was taken in 2002 from an prehistoric squirrel burrow in
Duvanny Yar outcrop in the lower reaches of the Kolyma River (pictured),
and is around 32,000 years old
WHAT IS CRYONICS?
The deep freezing of a body to -196°C (-321°F).
Anti-freeze compounds are injected into the corpse to stop cells being damaged.
The hope is that medical science will advance enough to bring the patient back to life.
Two main US organisations carry out cryonics in the US: Alcor, in Arizona, and the Cryonics Institute, in Michigan.
Russian firm KrioRus is one of two
facilities outside the US to offer the service, alongside Alcor’s
European laboratory in Portugal.
HOW IS IT MEANT TO WORK?
The process can only take place once the body has been declared legally dead.
Ideally, it begins within two minutes of the heart stopping and no more than 15.
The body must be packed in ice and injected with chemicals to reduce blood clotting.
At the cryonics facility, it is cooled to just above 0°C and the blood is replaced with a solution to preserve organs.
Cryonpreservation
is the deep freezing of a body to – 196°C (-321°F). Anti-freeze
compounds are injected into the corpse to stop cells being damaged
The body is injected with another solution to stop ice crystals forming in organs and tissues, then cooled to -130°C.
The final step is to place the body into a container which is lowered into a tank of liquid nitrogen at -196°C.
WHAT’S THE CHANCE OF SUCCESS?
Many experts say there is none.
Organs such as the heart and kidneys have never been successfully frozen and thawed.
It is even less likely a whole body, and the brain, could be without irreversible damage.
HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?
Charges at the Cryonics Institute start at around £28,000 ($35,000) to ‘members’ for whole-body cryopreservation.
Rival group Alcor charges £161,000 ($200,000) while KrioRus’ procedure will set you back £29,200 ($37,600).
HOW LONG BEFORE PEOPLE CAN BE BROUGHT BACK TO LIFE?
Cryonics organisations claim it could be decades or even centuries.
However, medical experts say once cells
are damaged during freezing and turned to ‘mush’ they cannot be
converted back to living tissue, any more than you can turn a scrambled
egg back into a raw egg.
WHAT ARE WOOLLY MAMMOTHS?
The woolly mammoth roamed the icy tundra
of Europe and North America for 140,000 years, disappearing at the end
of the Pleistocene period, 10,000 years ago.
They are one of the best understood
prehistoric animals known to science because their remains are often not
fossilised but frozen and preserved.
Males were around 12 feet (3.5m) tall, while the females were slightly smaller.
Curved tusks were up to 16 feet (5m) long and their underbellies boasted a coat of shaggy hair up to 3 feet (1m) long.
Tiny ears and short tails prevented vital body heat being lost.
Their trunks had ‘two fingers’ at the end to help them pluck grass, twigs and other vegetation.
They get their name from the Russian
‘mammut’, or earth mole, as it was believed the animals lived
underground and died on contact with light – explaining why they were
always found dead and half-buried.
Their bones were once believed to have belonged to extinct races of giants.
Woolly mammoths and modern-day elephants are closely related, sharing 99.4 per cent of their genes.
The two species took separate evolutionary
paths six million years ago, at about the same time humans and
chimpanzees went their own way.
Woolly mammoths co-existed with early humans, who hunted them for food and used their bones and tusks for making weapons and art
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