Scientists revive 48,500 -year-old ‘Zombie Virus’ buried Russia

Climate change due to global warming is rapidly thawing old permafrost, which may represent a new threat to humanity, according to scientists who have resurrected nearly two dozen viruses, including one that was frozen under a lake for more than 48,500 years.

Ancient permafrost samples from the Siberia area of Russia were investigated by European researchers. According to a Bloomberg story, they resurrected and described 13 novel diseases, which they nicknamed "zombie viruses," and discovered that they remained infectious despite being frozen for millennia.The Pandoravirus Yedoma is 48,500 years old, which surpasses the previous record held by a virus discovered by the same scientists in 2013 that was 30,000 years old.

Scientists have long warned that the thawing of permafrost caused by a rising atmosphere will exacerbate climate change by releasing previously contained greenhouse gases such as methane. However, its impact on dormant infections is little understood.

The team of researchers from Russia, Germany, and France stated that the biological danger of reanimating the viruses they researched was "completely minimal" due to the strains they focused on, which were primarily those capable of infecting amoeba microorganisms.

The possible resurgence of a virus that may infect animals or humans is significantly more dangerous, scientists warned, cautioning that their findings can be extrapolated to demonstrate the severity of the threat.

"It is therefore conceivable that ancient permafrost may release these unknown viruses upon thawing," they wrote in an unreviewed work submitted to the online repository bioRxiv, according to a Bloomberg report.

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