In the 1984 film Iceman, a prehistoric man who has been frozen in a glacier for 40,000 years is revived by a team of curious scientists. It’s a fascinating premise. Scientists have spent their entire careers deliberating over the life history of ancient mummies like Ötzi the Iceman, who was found frozen in the Alps around 5,000 years after his death. But what if we could just wake him up and ask him?
Unfortunately, the prospect of reviving a frozen mummy like Ötzi from an ice-induced slumber is purely fictional. Researchers have found that, in the wild, freezing temperatures destroy mammalian tissue. If the tissue is frozen quickly, ice crystals burst cells from the inside out. Meanwhile, if the tissue is frozen slowly, the water is sucked out of cells exposing them to toxic concentrations of electrolytes.
But, curiously, some frozen, ancient organisms far-older than Ötzi have come back to life. And, though it may be too late for Ötzi, one group of Russian researchers is hard at work trying to bring an entire ancient ecosystem back to life.
