Seed Banks: Storing the World’s Plants for the Future

Although you may have visited a bank in your lifetime, maybe to deposit or withdraw money, it is likely that you have never been to a seed bank. These buildings do not contain money or gold bars but instead hold something even more precious: the seeds or other materials of plants belonging to over 50,000 species—~12.5% of all known plant species. Human pressures on natural ecosystems threaten many plants, and protecting the vast array of plant life on Earth is critical for assuring that we can grow enough food for everyone on the planet in the years to come. For this reason, scientists have thought of freezing seeds and/or other parts of plants to preserve them and make them available for the future. Seed banks also allow scientists to study the history of certain plants, and these banks can provide them with the resources needed to change some plant traits in helpful ways.