''Chorisodontium aciphyllum'' is a species of moss found primarily on both sides of the

Drake Passage The Drake Passage (referred to as Mar de Hoces Hoces Sea"in Spanish-speaking countries) is the body of water between South America's Cape Horn, Chile and the South Shetland Islands of Antarctica. It connects the southwestern part of the Atla ...

. The species exhibits an extreme degree of cryptobiosis – the ability of a life form to enter a non- metabolic state, extending life indefinitely.

Description

''Chorisodontium aciphyllum'' grows in banks along the Antarctic coast in the Drake Passage region. It has also been found in Argentina, Chile, Antarctica, New Zealand, and South Georgia. As the moss banks grow taller, the layers more than an inch below the surface turn brown from lack of sun exposure and eventually become part of the permafrost. The mounds of moss can grow to be more than tall. ''Chorisodontium aciphyllum'' was first described by

Joseph Dalton Hooker Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker (30 June 1817 – 10 December 1911) was a British botanist and explorer in the 19th century. He was a founder of geographical botany and Charles Darwin's closest friend. For twenty years he served as director of ...

and William M. Wilson in 1844 as ''Dicranum aciphyllum'' in the '' London Journal of Botany''. Viktor Ferdinand Brotherus reclassified the species into its current genus in 1924.

Cryptobiosis

In 2014, terrestrial ecologist Peter Convey and his colleagues from the British Antarctic Survey and the

University of Reading The University of Reading is a public university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as University College, Reading, a University of Oxford extension college. The institution received the power to grant its own degrees in 192 ...

discovered that ''C. aciphyllum'' remains viable after being frozen for more than 1,500 years. Samples of the moss were harvested from

Signy Island Signy Island is a small subantarctic island in the South Orkney Islands of Antarctica. It was named by the Norwegian whaler Petter Sørlle (1884–1933) after his wife, Signy Therese. The island is about long and wide and rises to above se ...

in Antarctica using a coring drill and taken to the University of Reading for analysis. The core was cut into sections and exposed to light and temperature levels common to the regions in which the moss grows naturally. After three to eight weeks, depending on sample, new growth was visible. Convey said contamination was not a plausible explanation for the observed growth because only clean saws were used and because ''C. aciphyllum'' does not produce spores in the Antarctic region. The deepest (oldest) sample was dated between 1,533 and 1,697 years old using

radio-carbon dating Radiocarbon dating (also referred to as carbon dating or carbon-14 dating) is a method for determining the age of an object containing organic material by using the properties of radiocarbon, a radioactive isotope of carbon. The method was dev ...

techniques. The findings were published in ''

Current Biology ''Current Biology'' is a biweekly peer-reviewed scientific journal that covers all areas of biology, especially molecular biology, cell biology, genetics, neurobiology, ecology, and evolutionary biology. The journal includes research articles, ...

''. Previously, it was believed that a multi-cellular organism could only survive in a non-metabolic state of "suspended animation" known as cryptobiosis for a few decades. Cases of bacteria and other single-celled microbes were previously known. No moss had previously been documented to survive more than 20 years frozen, but moss stems frozen under Teardrop Glacier on Ellesmere Island for 400 years had spawned new growth when ground up and placed in petri dishes. Using complex cloning techniques, 31,000-year-old seeds of '' Silene stenophylla'' were revived in 2012.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15328722 Hypnales Flora of Antarctica Flora of South Georgia Island Flora of Chile Flora of Argentina Flora of New Zealand 2014 in science