Pithovirus Stayed Infectious 30,000 Years

In 2014, a woman named Chantal Abergel and a man named Jean-Michel Claverie, both scientists at Aix-Marseille University, discovered Pithovirus sibericum inside 30,000-year-old Siberian permafrost. They exposed a sample collected 30 meters below the surface to amoebas, and the ancient giant virus remained infectious, replicated inside the cells, and killed them. The virus cannot infect humans, but its survival raised concerns that melting permafrost or tundra drilling could uncover other unknown viruses capable of causing disease.

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