Hunt for the Oldest DNA
Opening Film
Nominee Science & Media Awards 24
Documentary / Niobe Thompson / Canada, USA / 2024 / 82 min / OmdU
How can we travel back in time? Is there a time machine? Yes. It’s DNA. It’s ancient DNA.
–Eske Willerslev
Hunt for the Oldest DNA tells the story of a maverick gene hunter, whose single-minded pursuit of an improbable scientific vision would tease and torment him before ending with a stunning triumph: a lost world recovered from a spoonful of dirt.
Two decades ago, Eske Willerslev had a radical idea: Could DNA, the fragile chemical code of life, survive intact in frozen sediment for millennia? Fellow scientists called him crazy. But the Danish biologist set out to prove everybody wrong, and his perseverance paid off with a landmark breakthrough–with massive implications for how we understand the deep past.
Film discussion: About the fascination of ancient DNA and the key role of environmental DNA in solving the biodiversity crisis.