Russian scientists have brought back to life a tiny predator that spent almost 40,000 years frozen beneath Siberia.
The strange organism was found alive nearly 30 feet below the icy surface.
Researchers at Tyumen State University extracted the creature from sediments close to the Kheigiyakha River in the Yamalo-Nenets region of Arctic Russia.
The microscopic predator dates back to the Late Pleistocene period, an era when woolly mammoths walked the Earth.
Scientists managed to keep the organism alive in laboratory settings after reviving it.
The species has been given the name Acanthocystis yamallongha, which translates to "spirit of the edge of the Earth."
Intricate scales cover the tiny creature's body, while it also features needle-like spikes measuring finer than a thousandth of a millimetre.
The organism is a single-celled predator belonging to a group called centrohelid heliozoans.
Researchers at Tyumen State University extracted the creature from sediments close to the Kheigiyakha River (file photo)
|GETTY
These creatures are characterised by their spiky, tentacled appearance.
Scientists were astonished to discover the organism remained alive after spending tens of thousands of years in suspended animation.
"I have never worked with samples of this age before, so I expected the diversity of microorganisms to be low," Sozonov said.
"That made the discovery of active protists all the more unexpected."
The 39,000-year-old creature endured its long frozen slumber through a process called cryptobiosis.
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During this near-death state, the organism's metabolism almost entirely stopped.
A protective shell made of silica formed around it.
According to the study, this revived organism represents a completely distinct evolutionary lineage that was previously unknown to science - and its feeding behaviour differs from related species alive today.
The discovery indicates that microscopic life forms may survive for much longer periods than researchers had thought possible.
Researcher German Sozonov said: "It genuinely can be described as a living fossil."
Though scientists stressed the organism presents no danger to people.
"It is not a parasite or pathogen," said Sozonov.
Siberian permafrost functions as a vast natural freezer, keeping ancient life forms intact for thousands of years.
This frozen ground spans approximately a quarter of all land in the Northern Hemisphere.
Researchers have previously recovered several ancient bacteria and microorganisms from the permafrost.