Scientists to analyze 40-year experiment to store seeds in Yakutia’s permafrost

TASS, July 2. Scientists of the Vavilov Institute of Plant Genetic Resources (VIR) will analyze results of an experiment to store seeds in the permafrost, which continues in Yakutia since the 1970s, Yakutia’s regional press center said. Earlier, President of the Russian Academy of Sciences Alexander Sergeyev suggested the Arctic Council could discuss organization of an international seed storage in Yakutia because the Global Seed Vault in West Spitsbergen’s rock, where all countries store their seed samples, has been collapsing due to the thawing permafrost. "Scientists of the Vavilov Institute of Plant Genetic Resources (VIR) will visit Yakutia to analyze results of the experiment, which has continued for more than four decades," the release reads. "Back in the 1970s, VIR, the Melnikov Permafrost Institute and the Safronov Yakut Scientific Research Institute of Agriculture [of the Russian Academy of Sciences] began the project to see how the perennially frozen ground could be used for storage of seeds from the Vavilov Institute’s collection". More than 11,000 samples of agricultural and wild plants’ seeds have been stored in Yakutia at the depth of eleven meters. The natural cold from the permafrost minimizes electricity expenses. An annual electricity bill is only 4,000 rubles ($54), the press center said. "The North scientific and educational center jointly with Russia’s plant resources leading research institute may support a major increase of the storage areas in Yakutia, and thus the facility will be able to compete with similar foreign storages," the regional press center said. In the 1970s, scientists offered technologies to support year-round freezing temperatures inside the soils so that the seeds could be stored safely and could germinate well. The inspection after 30 years of storage showed the seeds germination remained at 95%. Read more