Advertisement

World's oldest DNA by a million years 'could help battle climate change'

Massive icebergs from Jakobshavn Glacier melting in Disko Bay on sunny summer evening, Ilulissat, Greenland.
The world's oldest DNA was unearthed in Greenland. (Getty)

Scientists have identified the oldest DNA ever, beating the previous record-holder by a million years – and it could be crucial in the battle against climate change.

The two-million-year-old DNA was found in sediment in northern Greenland, and dates from a time of rapidly rising global temperatures.

The DNA from Greenland has been used to map a two-million-year-old ecosystem, and scientists hope that it could offer hints on how to counteract the impact of global warming.

It’s a million years older than the previous record-holder, which was sampled from a Siberian mammoth bone.

Read more; Ancient remains could rewrite history of human intelligence

Professor Willerslev, a fellow of Cambridge University’s St John’s College, said: “A new chapter spanning one million extra years of history has finally been opened and for the first time we can look directly at the DNA of a past ecosystem that far back in time.

“DNA can degrade quickly but we’ve shown that under the right circumstances, we can now go back further in time than anyone could have dared imagine.”

The 41 usable DNA samples were found hidden in clay and quartz in the Kobenhavn Formation, a sediment deposit almost 100 metres thick, tucked in the mouth of a fjord in the Arctic Ocean.

Each sample is a few millionths of a millimetre long.

Scientists also discovered evidence of animals, plants and microorganisms including reindeer, hares, lemmings, birch and poplar trees.

Read more: Ancient skull found in China could rewrite history of the human race

Researchers found Mastodon, an ice age mammal, roamed as far as Greenland before becoming extinct.

It was previously thought the range of the elephant-like animals did not extend that far from its known North and Central America origins.

Professor Kurt H Kjaer, of Copenhagen University’s Lundbeck Foundation GeoGenetics Centre, said: “The ancient DNA samples were found buried deep in sediment that had built-up over 20,000 years.

“The sediment was eventually preserved in ice or permafrost and, crucially, not disturbed by humans for two million years.”

Detective work by a team of 40 researchers from Denmark, the UK, France, Sweden, Norway, the USA and Germany unlocked the secrets of the DNA fragments.

“Expeditions are expensive and many of the samples were taken back in 2006 when the team were in Greenland for another project. They have been stored ever since,” said Prof Kjaer.

“It wasn’t until a new generation of DNA extraction and sequencing equipment was developed that we’ve been able to locate and identify extremely small and damaged fragments of DNA in the sediment samples.”

“It is possible that genetic engineering could mimic the strategy developed by plants and trees two million years ago to survive in a climate characterised by rising temperatures and prevent the extinction of some species, plants and trees.

“This is one of the reasons this scientific advance is so significant because it could reveal how to attempt to counteract the devastating impact of global warming.”

Prof Willerslev said it “may be possible that clay may have preserved ancient DNA in warm, humid environments in sites found in Africa”.

“If we can begin to explore ancient DNA in clay grains from Africa, we may be able to gather ground-breaking information about the origin of many different species – perhaps even new knowledge about the first humans and their ancestors – the possibilities are endless,” he said.

Watch: How well do genetic ancestry testing kits work