Researchers at France’s National Center for Scientific Research have revived more than a dozen prehistoric viruses that were previously trapped deep in the Siberian permafrost, according to a preprint study.
From seven ancient permafrost samples, scientists were able to document 13 never-before-seen viruses that lay dormant, frozen in ice, for tens of thousands of years.
In 2014, the same researchers discovered a 30,000-year-old virus trapped in permafrost, the BBC reported. The discovery was ground-breaking because after so much time the virus was still able to infect organisms. But now they’ve beaten their own record by reviving a virus that’s 48,500 years old.
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The ancient virus has been given the name Pandoravirus yedoma, which recognizes its size and the type of permafrost in which it was found, according to Science Alert.
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Scientists are thawing these ancient viruses to assess their impact on public health. As permafrost, or permanently frozen land, melts in the Northern Hemisphere, the thawing of the ice releases tons of trapped chemicals and microbes.
“Due to climate warming, the irreversible thawing of permafrost releases organic matter frozen for up to a million years, most of which decomposes into carbon dioxide and methane, further enhancing the greenhouse effect,” the study authors wrote. “Some of this organic matter also consists of reanimated cellular microbes (prokaryotes, single-celled eukaryotes) as well as viruses that have remained latent since prehistoric times.”
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Some of these “zombie viruses” could potentially be dangerous to humans, the authors warn. And in fact, thawing permafrost has already taken its toll.
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In 2016, one child died and dozens of people were hospitalized after an anthrax outbreak in Siberia. Officials believe the outbreak began because a heat wave thawed the permafrost and uncovered the carcass of a reindeer infected with anthrax decades ago. About 2,300 reindeer died in the outbreak.
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The revived viruses that the researchers observed belonged to the following virus subtypes: pandoravirus, cedravirus, megavirus, pacmanvirus, and pitovirus. These viruses are considered “giant” because they are large and easily seen using a light microscope.
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For this reason, researchers believe that there are many other smaller viruses that have escaped scrutiny.
Scientists have also used amoeba cells as “viral bait” to see which viruses are still active and capable of infecting an organism. The researchers said this limited their results to detecting only “lytic viruses” that destroy their host, as opposed to other types of viruses that can fuse with the host’s DNA.
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One good lining is that the study’s authors say there is a “negligible” risk of these amoeba-infecting viruses having a dangerous effect on humans. But that doesn’t mean all ancient viruses are harmless.
The authors note that the “risky” search for viruses found in “permafrost-preserved remains of mammoths, woolly rhinos or prehistoric horses” is another story entirely.
It is not clear whether these ancient viruses could infect a host once exposed to external conditions such as heat, oxygen and UV rays. But researchers say the likelihood of such a situation is increasing as more of the permafrost thaws and more people begin to inhabit the melting Arctic for commercial and industrial ventures.
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