Russia is rich in palaeontological specimens, but its brutal war in Ukraine is threatening the research and relationships that help uncover the past.
At the heart of many of these discoveries are decades-long relationships between Russian and foreign researchers. But the war — and the response from the West — has made these collaborations “near impossible”, says Dalén. Many Western countries and universities cut ties with Russian institutions after the invasion. The United States announced in June that it will wind down research ties with Russia.
Now, with stories about Ukrainian colleagues hiding in bomb shelters, fleeing their homes and in some cases fighting on the front lines, many Western palaeontologists are reluctant to ask the Russian government for anything. “It feels dirty,” says a researcher who asked to remain anonymous to protect the identities of people they work with. One colleague, they say, stayed in Kyiv to safeguard the city’s archaeological collections. “It’s horrible,” they say.
Most of the expertise in working with fragile DNA and amino acids that are thousands of years old is in laboratories in North America and Western Europe. Over the past few years, Russian researchers have tended to outsource this delicate work to colleagues abroad. These arrangements led to the Denisovan discovery co-authored by researchers in Germany, who sequenced the DNA from a finger bone sent to them by Russian colleagues.
Russian scientists have been developing their own palaeontological sequencing capabilities for years. But their progress will probably be halted for as long as sanctions prevent labs from ordering reagents from abroad.
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