What if something catastrophic happened here on Earth? How would we recreate ecosystems destroyed? Scientists are betting the moon is the answer.
MINNEAPOLIS — Tucked away in a lab on the University of Minnesota campus, there is a microscopic level of work being done to potentially help preserve our whole world. The concept sounds futuristic, but it’s happening right now.
“What we’re working on is both cells, tissues, whole organs, and whole organisms, and how to cryopreserve them and have them available as living biological systems that can be stored, or shipped, or banked for social impact and for the good of all,” said Professor John Bischof.
Professor Bischof’s work in cryobiology is groundbreaking. Combined with several other scientists across the country and the Smithsonian Institute, they plan to use it for something that may seem more like science fiction.
“What would it look like to create a genuinely public cooperative single biorepository that is not vulnerable to ecological, nuclear, other disasters on Earth and could really be a hedge against disaster? Our big insurance policy up on the moon,” said Professor Susan Wolf.
Wolf, a professor of law and medicine at the University of Minnesota, said we already have a patchwork of biorepositories here on Earth, but they are not necessarily coordinated with one another, and rely on extremely low temperatures to keep the samples safe. Take Svalbard seed vault in Norway for example; the Seed Vault provides long-term storage for duplicates of seeds from crops around the world, but in 2016, higher-than-normal temperatures caused flooding in part of the vault.
“It didn’t ruin the collection, but it was a big red flag. A huge wake-up call that we need to think beyond our planet. That’s what made us start to think about the moon,” said Wolf.
The shadowed craters on the moon are cold enough to store biosamples without the need for electricity or human intervention, some -200 degrees Celsius. And that’s where Professor Bischof’s research comes in — it provides the answer to how?
“Essentially when we are cryopreserving anything the enemy is ice. When ice forms, it expands, it forms crystals, and if that happens in a cell, it will rip the cell apart and destroy it,” said Dr. Joe Kanga, a U of M Post-Doctoral Associate.
“To mitigate that, we add these special chemicals called cryoprotectants. They’re like sugars or alcohols or glycols, similar to antifreeze you put in your car, and that makes it harder for ice to form in the system,” he said.
In this lab, they are working with zebrafish. The only fish on the planet to be frozen as an embryo and brought back to life.
“They get pulled out of the liquid nitrogen when they are ready to be rewarmed and they are shot with this laser and that heats them up at millions of degrees per minute so like in a matter of milliseconds it goes from -200 degrees C up to room temperature,” Kanga said.
Every organism behaves differently, but once they perfect the system, they can translate it to other organisms. These zebrafish were grown and bred and spawned normal baby fish.
“That part is good. Especially when you’re thinking in the context of this lunar biorepository. Will they be able to bring back the ecosystem? So, if they can breed normally, then all signs are positive,” said Bischof.
There is plenty to still work out, like how do you get the cells safely to space, without exposure to radiation? Who controls it? What exactly will they store on the moon? Bischof said it’s unlikely that every organism on earth could or would be stored, but they are working on key organisms that can help replace and rebuild whole ecosystems.
The group of scientists, doctors, ethicists and specialists in a variety of disciplines are working right now to answer all of that. They already know what they plan to send up first. A fibroblast, similar to a skin cell, from a Goby Fish. And if you’re thinking we’re still a long way off from this being reality… think again.
“There is an effort underway that’s gaining traction, and we may actually be on a mission to space sometime in the near future,” said Bischof.
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