Siberia is a treasure trove for paleontologists. For more than a decade, Love Dalén, an evolutionary geneticist at the Swedish Museum of Natural History in Stockholm, has traveled to Russia every two years to hunt the remains of preserved mammoths and other Ice Age creatures. in permafrost. Earlier this year, after two years of pandemic restrictions, Daten and his team were preparing to set off for a long-delayed Russian nature studies expedition.
But in February, Russia invaded Ukraine. Since then, “everything has changed,” he says. Amid restrictions and penalties, Dalén was forced to cancel the shipment. Its setting is far from unique.
The war has plunged many Russian-linked scientists into a state of uncertainty about the long-term nature of their studies and their relations with their Russian colleagues. Between sanctions, collapsed collaborations and canceled fieldwork, the study of the afterlife through magnificently preserved Russian paleontological specimens. , has become an unforeseen victim of war.
It’s still unclear what exactly the crash will mean for the floor. But Daten says one thing is for sure: “We will know less about the afterlife because of this war. “
Russia has been in the midst of some of the greatest archaeological and paleontological discoveries of the century, adding the discovery of the Denisovans, an ancient human species discovered in a Siberian cave and described in 20101. Siberia also delivered a great diversity of other Pleistocene Remains. Epoch, which lasted around 2. 5 million years until 11,700 years ago and is colloquially called the Ice Age.
The quality and quantity of those remains is what makes Russian specimens so special. Up to 90% of all known mammoth fossils come from Yakutia, a region in eastern Siberia. DNA from a 1. 6-million-year-old mammoth tooth, the oldest genome ever recorded, as reported last year. 2
At the center of many of those discoveries are decades-long relations between Russians and foreigners. But the war, and the reaction of the West, have made such collaborations “almost impossible,” Says Dalén. Many Western countries and universities severed ties with Russian institutions. after the invasion. The United States announced in June that it would end its ties with Russia.
Most of these provisions do not prohibit collaborations with individual scientists in Russia. But uncertainty has crippled the plans. Olga Potapova, a paleontologist at the Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, South Dakota, planned to publish studies on woolly rhinos and cave lions that included scholars in Russia. But after the invasion, he received emails from some Western colleagues, explaining that he may no longer paint with those study groups. “Everything is behind schedule and I don’t know what to do,” he says.
For Western researchers, the war has sparked a crisis that has been brewing since Russia annexed Crimea to Ukraine in 2014. The peninsula is home to vital Neanderthal sites and, since its annexation, researchers have had to ask Russia for permission to access it.
Now, with the stories of Ukrainian colleagues hiding in bomb shelters, fleeing their homes and, in some cases, fighting at the front, many Western paleontologists are reluctant to ask the Russian government anything. “It’s dirty,” says one researcher who asked to remain anonymous about the identities of the other people he works with. A colleague, they say, stayed in Kyiv to safeguard the city’s archaeological collections. “It’s horrible,” they say. All you can hope for is that you never find yourself in a scenario where you have to risk your life to save your collection. “
At the same time, Western researchers contact their Russian colleagues for fear that the Kremlin will scrutinize them. feeling of war.
“The fact that one email address comes from the United States and another is Russian can draw attention,” says another researcher who asked to remain anonymous to protect his colleagues in Russia. “We’re about to anything can happen if we’re not careful. “
Russian science is affected by the breakdown of relations. One of the hardest-hit areas is studies on ancient DNA, says Albert Protopopov, a paleontologist at the Sakha Republic Academy of Sciences in Yakutsk, Russia.
Most of the experience in running with fragile DNA and thousands of years old amino acids is discovered in laboratories in North America and Western Europe. In recent years, Russian researchers have tended to outsource these paintings to colleagues abroad. These arrangements led to the discovery of Denisovan co-written by German researchers, who sequenced DNA from a finger bone that they sent to them through Russian colleagues.
A decade later, almost all known Denisovan fossils come from the same Siberian cave. But between the pandemic and the war, obtaining new samples was tricky and, as a result, studies “stalled,” says Katerina Douka, an archaeologist at the University of Vienna.
“Denisova’s discoveries captivated the world,” she says. To see this collapse in a few months is certainly heartbreaking. “
Russian scientists have been devising their own paleontological sequencing functions for years, but their progress will most likely stall as long as sanctions prevent labs from ordering reagents abroad.
Potapova, who experienced Russia’s economic recession after the fall of the Soviet Union, says the current slowdown will invest in paleontology and other studies in Russia in the years to come. “Scientifically, it will be devastating,” he said, adding that his Russian colleagues “will be fortunate to keep their salaries. “
Protopopov says many of his Russian colleagues have also had to suspend their boxing seasons at Yakutia this year. He hopes that foreign cooperation will resume soon, noting that Russia and the West maintained close clinical ties during the Cold War. “This cooperation is smart for everyone,” he says.
But even if the restrictions were lifted, Western scientists would still be worried about returning to Russia. “The scenario is too volatile,” says one researcher who agreed to speak on condition of anonymity. “Honestly, I don’t need to end up in a Russian prison. “
Safety is the only concern. Access to the sites requires permissions, and Western researchers fear the government will reject them as propaganda. Similarly, returning to the box while Russian President Vladimir Putin remains in power can be perceived as a tacit endorsement of his regime.
For his part, Dalén is content to wait for the sanctions. He calls for an impact on his studies comparable to that of Ukrainians.
“There are more things to understand the past,” he says. These fossils have been resting here for thousands of years. They can wait a little longer until this is resolved. “
doi: https://doi. org/10. 1038/d41586-022-01790-0
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