With thousands of species at risk of extinction, scientists have devised a radical plan: a vault filled with preserved samples of our planet’s most important and at-risk creatures located on the moon.
An international team of experts says threats from climate change and habitat loss have outpaced our ability to protect species in their natural habitats, necessitating urgent action. A biorepository of preserved cells, and the crucial DNA within them, could be used to enhance genetic diversity in small populations of critically endangered species, or to clone and create new individuals in the worst-case scenario of extinction.
A repository to safeguard biological samples from disaster is not a new idea. The Svalbard global seed vault on a remote Norwegian island in the Arctic Circle provides frozen storage of seeds to ensure important food crops can be re-established if wiped out by disease or drought. Recent flooding as a result of warm temperatures, however, has proven that not even Svalbard is safe from the effects of climate breakdown.
It’s the most hail mary of hail marys. You’re investing billions of dollars trying to move miniscule amounts of shit off-planet, rather than renewing maintenance on the Svalbard Global Seed Vault or securing unmolested rain forest from another generation of clear cutters.
It just feels like people want to put something on the moon and this is another excuse.
That’s true and I don’t disagree. Efforts make sense to stay planet bound and actually put our house in order.