Scientific research that has been going on for 144 years

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Marjorie Weber holds a 144-year-old seed bottle in the hands of scientific project researcher Marjorie Weber

Scientists have a reputation for being patient. Many scientists research the same subject for years. Not everyone is successful. Still, scientists don't stop. Such a mysterious scientific research is going on in the United States. This research has been going on for 144 years with plant seeds. The botanist William Bill, who began this study in 1879, filled 20 glass bottles with wet sand and 50 seeds of 23 species and buried them in the ground on the campus of Michigan State University. After 20 years one bottle is taken out from the soil to see if the seeds will germinate or not.

More than a century ago, botanist William James Bill reported that 50 newly grown seeds of 23 different plants were selected for research. The seeds were kept separately in 20 bottles for future research. The seeds are well mixed in moderately moist sand and kept in bottles.

Bill retired in 1910 at the age of 77. Botanist HT Darlington then took charge of the research. Marjorie Weber, researcher of the long-running scientific project, said that in the beginning, botanist Bill would pull a bottle out of the soil every five years. Eight bottles were found up to 1920. The germination rate of the seeds in those bottles was quite good. Bill's successor scientists later released a bottle every 10 years at the beginning. After 20 years since 1980, a bottle has been taken out and tested.

Scientists have kept the location of the bottles under the ground a secret. They released the 16th bottle in 2021. The seeds in the bottle appear to be dead seeds but have germinated. A research paper was published in the American Journal of Botany about the effectiveness of this seed. It says that the 16th bottle contains a mixture of seeds of Verbascum thapsus and Verbascum blataria species. The seeds of the yellow flower named Verbascum are more than one and a half hundred years old but have surprised everyone by successfully sprouting.

Botanist Bill did not save any seeds separately when filling all the bottles with seeds. As a result, the seeds of the two species coexisted to form a new genetic mixture. Another bottle of seed germination will be attempted after 2040. 'There are only four bottles left,' said project researcher David Lawrie. For this reason we want to prolong the research. The remaining bottles will be tested every 30 years from 2040. This research is going on to know how to preserve plants through old seeds.'