Ice Age flower
Known as Silene stenophylla, it is the oldest plant to be regenerated, according to scientists. It is fertile and able to produce viable white flowers and seeds. “The squirrels dug the frozen ground to build their burrows, which are about the size of a soccer ball. They first put in hay and then animal fur for a perfect storage chamber,” said Stanislav Gubin, one of the authors of the study, who spent years rummaging through the area for squirrel burrows. “It’s a natural cryobank.” The tissue can be preserved in ice for thousands of years, paving the way for a possible resurrection of the Ice Age mammals.

Svetlana Yashina, Institute of Cell Biophysics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, who led the work of tissue regeneration, said the plant was resurrected much like its modern version, which continues to grow in the same area of Siberia.

The researchers were able to retrieve the fruit of the plant after investigating dozens of fossils hidden in ice deposits on the bank of the Kolyma River in northeastern Siberia, with sediment dating from 30,000 to 32,000 years.

Ice Age flower

Silene stenophylla is the oldest plant to be regenerated, according to scientists, which is fertile and able to produce viable white flowers and seeds.

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