Doomsday Vault or Doomsday Vault opened its doors wide to receive shipments from the gene bank this week. This gigantic structure set in the Arctic landscape is home to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault which is home to the world's largest collection of agricultural biodiversity.
Doomsday Dome was created to secure the world's food sources in the future by offering the storage of seed genes from around the world that are claimed to be safe, free, and long-term in preparation for the apocalypse due to natural disasters and environmental damage.
Quoted from Reuters, this abundant seed has just come from gene banks from Sudan, Uganda, New Zealand, Germany and Lebanon. The arrival of these seeds will add to the existing collection of more than 1.1 million seed samples representing approximately 6,000 plant species.
The vault inside the vault is only opened a few times each year in an effort to protect its contents from contamination from the outside world. As such, this next shipment is an interesting entry in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault records.
Varieties that are thought to join existing seed collections include millet, sorghum, and wheat which will serve as reserve stocks for the original gene bank. Despite its sci-fi title, this dome focuses largely on maintaining plant genetic diversity to ensure a future world food supply.
The addition of a new type of wheat to the Doomsday Dome wardrobe will be very important because it is one of the three main crops that produce more than 40% of the world's calories. The other two are corn and rice.
"While there may be a seed warehouse role in the event of a global catastrophe, its value is considered to be more focused on providing reserves for individual collections if the original samples, and their duplicates in conventional gene banks, are lost due to a natural disaster, human conflict, policy change, mismanagement, or other circumstances. ," reads a statement on the Svalbard Global Seed Vault website.
That said, this apocalypse-prepared vault isn't the only safe haven for Earth's botanical species should something happen. The idea even inspired researchers from the University of Arizona to think about a storehouse for the logistical supplies of life placed on the Moon. Is it possible?