‘Zombie viruses’ from 48 thousand years ago in Siberia are still contagious and may cause a new pandemic! Scientists have already begun planning a surveillance network to detect the first cases of a disease caused by ancient micro-organisms.
“Currently, analyzes of pandemic threats focus on diseases that may emerge in southern regions and then spread north. In contrast, little weight is given to an epidemic that may emerge in far northern regions and then spread south,” said geneticist Jean-Michel Claverie of Aix-Marseille University. “I believe this is an oversight. There are viruses out there that have the potential to infect humans and start a new epidemic,” he says.[1]
Marion Koopmans, a virologist at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, supports this view: “We don’t know which viruses are hidden in the permafrost, but I think there is a concrete risk that could trigger an epidemic, for example an old strain of polio. We have to assume that something like this could happen.”
We have reported it before; These ‘zombie viruses’ have been under the spotlight for some time, raising fears that a new global health crisis could be triggered. Claverie and his team had demonstrated that viruses in Siberia were able to infect single-celled organisms even though they had been buried in permafrost for thousands of years.
The cold, dark and oxygen-free environment created by permafrost perfectly preserves the fossils of extinct ancient creatures.
Further research published last year[2] revealed the existence of several different viral strains from seven different sites in Siberia and showed that they could infect cultured cells. One of the virus samples was exactly 48 thousand 500 years old.
“The viruses we studied could only infect amoebae and did not pose any risk to humans. However, this does not mean that other viruses currently in frozen form cannot cause disease in humans. For example, we detected genomic traces of well-known pathogens poxvirus and herpesviruses,” Claverie told the Guardian.
What is permafrost?
The soil layer that has been completely frozen for many years is called permafrost. Permafrost, which covers one-fifth of the northern hemisphere, is rapidly thawing due to climate change; thus unearthing a range of ancient remains, from viruses and bacteria to woolly mammoths and even a perfectly preserved cave bear.
Earth’s permafrost is changing
Dr. Claverie clarified the issue in a recent interview with the Observer: “The most important point about permafrost is that it is cold, dark and devoid of oxygen. This provides a perfect environment for preserving biological materials. For example, when you put yoghurt in permafrost, it is still edible 50 thousand years later.”
But the world’s permafrost is changing. The upper layers of the planet’s main reserves in Canada, Siberia and Alaska are melting as climate change disproportionately affects the Arctic. According to meteorologists, the region is warming several times faster than the average rate of increase in global warming.
Scientists estimate that some layers of permafrost have been frozen for hundreds of thousands of years.
Claverie says it’s not just the melting of permafrost that poses the most immediate risk.
The danger comes from another effect of global warming: the disappearance of Arctic sea ice. This allows for increased shipping, traffic and industrial development in Siberia. Major mining operations are planned; It is envisaged to drill large holes in deep permafrost to extract oil and ore. These operations will release large amounts of pathogens. Miners will come in and breathe in the viruses. The consequences could be disastrous.
Scientists think there may be viruses in the deepest levels of permafrost that are a million years old (that is, much older than our species, which is thought to have emerged about 300 thousand years ago). “Our immune systems may have never come into contact with some of these microbes, which is another cause for concern,” according to Claverie.
Dr. Koopmans gives examples from the past: “If you look at the history of epidemics, one of the most important factors is changes in land use. Nipah virus was spread by fruit bats driven out of their habitat by humans. Similarly, monkeypox has been associated with the spread of urbanization in Africa. ‘The Arctic’ “That’s what we’re about to witness: a complete change in land use. And as we’ve seen, this can be dangerous.”
That’s why Claverie and other scientists are working on a local project with UArctic University, an international educational network in the polar region, to establish quarantine facilities and contain the infection by detecting the first cases.
“The scenario of an unknown virus that once infected a Neanderthal returning to us has become a possibility, albeit a low one,” says Claverie and adds: “We now face a concrete threat. We need to be prepared to deal with it. It’s that simple.”
Scientists revived ancient ‘zombie’ virus after 50 thousand years and the result: It’s still contagious!
Scientists have managed to revive ancient ‘zombie’ viruses from permafrost and discovered they can still infect single-celled amoebae.
Rising temperatures in the Arctic are thawing the region’s permafrost, potentially activating viruses that could endanger animal and human health after lying dormant for tens of thousands of years.[3]
Permafrost, which covers about one-fifth of the Northern Hemisphere, has formed the basis of Arctic forests in Alaska, Canada and Russia for thousands of years. Serving as a time capsule, permafrost preserves the remains of a number of extinct animals as well as ancient viruses.
The reason why permafrost is a good storage environment is that it is not only cold but also an oxygen-free environment where light cannot penetrate. But today temperatures in the Arctic are warming four times faster than the rest of the planet, weakening the upper layer of permafrost in the region.
French professor Jean-Michel Claverie found frozen virus strains dating back thousands of years in various permafrost areas in Siberia. The oldest type, dating back to 48,500 years ago, came from a soil sample taken from an underground lake. The youngest specimens found in the stomach and fur of a woolly mammoth were 27 thousand years old.
References:
- Alempic JM, Lartigue A, Goncharov AE, Grosse G, Strauss J, Tikhonov AN, Fedorov AN, Poirot O, Legendre M, Santini S, Abergel C, Claverie JM. An Update on Eukaryotic Viruses Revived from Ancient Permafrost. Viruses. 2023 Feb 18;15(2):564. doi: 10.3390/v15020564. PMID: 36851778; PMCID: PMC9958942.
- Mohite P, Pandhare R, Mukerjee N, Sharma R, Dey A, Mohapatra RK, Mishra S, Sarangi AK, Padhi BK, Sah R. Zombie virus revitalized from permafrost: Facts and fiction. New Microbes New Infect. 2023 Apr 23;53:101113. doi: 10.1016/j.nmni.2023.101113. PMID: 37441152; PMCID: PMC10333728.
- Alempic, J.-M.; Lartigue, A.; Goncharov, A.E.; Grosse, G.; Strauss, J.; Tikhonov, A.N.; Fedorov, A.N.; Poirot, O.; Legendre, M.; Santini, S.; et al. An Update on Eukaryotic Viruses Revived from Ancient Permafrost. Viruses 2023, 15, 564. https://doi.org/10.3390/v15020564