The Hunt for the Oldest DNA (2024)
Overview
Three million years ago, camels roamed through Greenland’s endless forests and our ancestors lived in the trees. It all came to an end with the Ice Ages. What died and what survived, as natural selection shaped the evolutionary tree during this epochal shift from hot to cold? Until now, scientists have known less about the natural world before the Ice Age than they did about the age of dinosaurs, which ended 64 million years ago. A new discovery is set to reveal this lost world, species by species. Led by Danish gene-hunter Eske Willerslev, a team of scientists for the first time in history is sequencing DNA from before the Ice Age. The picture that emerges is of a hot planet, when forests blanketed the Arctic and carbon levels matched those in our atmosphere today. Is this a portrait of our own climate future?
Production Companies
Additional Info
| Budget | $0.00 |
|---|---|
| Revenue | $0.00 |
| Original Language | en |
| Popularity | 0.094 |
Directed By
Niobe Thompson
Crew
Niobe Thompson
TOP CAST
Similar Movies
Stephen Hawking and The Theory of Everything
Twenty years after A Brief History of Time flummoxed the world with its big numbers and black holes, its author, Stephen Hawking, concedes that the "ultimate theory" he'd believed to be imminent - which would conclusively explain the origins of life, the universe and everything - remains frustratingly elusive. Yet despite his failing health and the seeming impossibility of the task, Hawking is still devoted to his work; an extraordinary drive that's captured here in fleeting interview snippets and footage of the scientist sharing a microwave dinner with some fawning PhD students. Though the pop-science tutorials that dapple the first of this two-part biography are winningly perky, Hawking, alas, remains as tricky to fathom as his boggling quantum whatnots
Cracking the Shakespeare Code
Norwegian researcher Petter Amundsen claims to have deciphered a secret code hidden in legendary playwright William Shakespeare's works that reveals a map leading to the location of certain treasures. British Shakespearean scholar Robert Crumpton embarks on a mission to prove he is spectacularly wrong. (A remake of “Shakespeare: The Hidden Truth,” including new discoveries.)
Memory Games
Without memory we are nothing. Memory makes us human. It’s who we are. Memory Games offers a thrilling insight into the lives of four athletes from the United States, Germany, and Mongolia as they compete for the title of World Memory Champion. Their unique approaches to memorizing and recalling mind-boggling amounts of information and their life stories form the basis for a visually stunning and thought-provoking documentary that looks at how memory permeates every aspect of our lives.
Low-Tech
What if, before rushing headfront into technology progress, we think twice about it ? As our societies bet on technology outbids, some chose to invest on sobriety : the "low tech".
Unrest
When Harvard PhD student Jennifer Brea is struck down at 28 by a fever that leaves her bedridden, doctors tell her it’s "all in her head." Determined to live, she sets out on a virtual journey to document her story—and four other families' stories—fighting a disease medicine forgot.
Unknown: The Lost Pyramid
Egyptian archeologists dig into history, discovering tombs and artifacts over 4,000 years old as they search for a buried pyramid in this documentary.
Unknown: Cosmic Time Machine
A unique behind-the-scenes access to NASA’s ambitious mission to launch the James Webb Space Telescope, following a team of engineers and scientists as they take the next giant leap in our quest to understand the universe.
Wild Wild Space
Follow three rocket and satellite companies – Astra Space, Rocket Lab, and Planet Labs – and the quests of their idiosyncratic founders to conquer the burgeoning space industry.
A Tear in the Sky
A Tear in the Sky takes you on an unprecedented journey into the UAP/UFO phenomenon as we follow a team of world-renowned experts, scientists, and military personnel who will attempt to unravel the UAP/UFO mysteries using state-of-the-art, military-grade equipment, and technology. While the UFO phenomenon has existed since the dawn of recorded history, very little scientific research is accessible to the public. Most of the serious research is conducted by various governments and militaries across the planet; this film is a documentary on how a team of military veterans, scientists, and researchers come together and launch an investigation into this fascinating world of the unknown while providing the data and results to the public.
Dinosaurs: The Final Day with David Attenborough
David Attenborough brings to life, in unprecedented detail, the last days of the dinosaurs. Palaeontologist Robert DePalma has made an incredible discovery in a prehistoric graveyard: fossilised creatures, astonishingly well preserved, that could help change our understanding of the last days of the dinosaurs. Evidence from his site records the day when an asteroid bigger than Mount Everest devastated our planet and caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. Based on brand new evidence, witness the catastrophic events of that day play out minute by minute.
When Whales Walked: Journeys in Deep Time
Discover the evolutionary secrets of some of the world’s most majestic creatures. From voracious crocodiles and acrobatic birds to stupendous whales and majestic elephants, this documentary follows top scientists on a global adventure as they follow clues from the fossil record and change what we thought we knew about the evolution of iconic beasts.
The Journey of Man: A Genetic Odyssey
Many geneticists and archaeologists have long surmised that human life began in Africa. Dr. Spencer Wells, one of a group of scientists studying the origin of human life, offers evidence and theories to support such a thesis in this PBS special. He claims that Africa was populated by only a few thousand people that some deserted their homeland in a conquest that has resulted in global domination.
Protecting Paradise: The Story of Niue
The documentary follows leaders and community members from the tropical Pacific island nation who are making bold changes to move the needle on marine protection. With a population of under 2,000 people and a marine reserve covering 40% of its waters, Niue has demonstrated the ways in which traditional knowledge and contemporary science can live in harmony for the benefit of people and the planet.
What Is a Woman?
Matt Walsh's controversial doc challenges radical gender ideology through provocative interviews and humor.
The Rise and Fall of the Etruscans
For eight centuries, between the 9th and 1st century BC, the Etruscans, inhabitants of the Italian peninsula, were one of the most powerful peoples of the Mediterranean basin, and when they disappeared they left behind impressive necropolises, vestiges of sanctuaries and even entire cities. How did they attain such power? How far did they extend their dominion and influence? What were the causes of their decline?
Caligula with Mary Beard
What is true and what is false in the hideous stories spread about the controversial figure of the Roman emperor Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (12-41), nicknamed Caligula? Professor Mary Beard explains what is accurate and what is mythical in the historical accounts that portray him as an unbalanced despot. Was he a sadistic tyrant, as Roman historians have told, or perhaps the truth about him was manipulated because of political interests?