Long term seed preservation in permafrost of Arctic; the history of experiment and new challenges

Preservation of biodiverse genetic resources of crops and cultured plants live is the important state task. Plant seeds are suitable object regarded as genetic material to be long term-stored, since the each accession is a small package, not demanding a special care. There is a large plant collection over 322 accessions in N.I. Vavilov Institute of Plant Genetic Recourses (VIR), Russia. Genetically determined longevity of seeds can be prolonged by organization of optimized condition of storage. The necessary condition should be created to extend the germination power of seed for long time. There are the seed banks in the world with modern highly technological maintenance, but in case highly extremely situation, the natural seed repository can be more preferable. This sort of seed repository has been launched in the Taymyr Peninsula. Since 1974 the experiment on study of preservation qualities of different products in different packaging has been performed in many research institutes. All-Russian Research Institute of Vegetable Breeding and Seed Production is a partner in the whole experiment. Researchers of breeding laboratories have proved seeds of 27 accessions of main vegetable group, which have been placed in three replications with account of taking the accessions out in 2025, 2035 and 2050.