Can an extinct tree be brought to life?

Abotanical discovery gives hope for resurrecting Rapa Nui's toromiro tree with 'experimental saplings'

- Sofia Quaglia

In the Mataveri Otai nursery on the island of Rapa Nui, Estefany Paté cradles a bag of soil with a 10cm sprout as if it is a baby. "It's been so emotional to have it here," said Paté, who works for Chile's National Forest Corporation (Conaf).

"It was here before us; it was here before the moai," she said, referring to the megalithic statues that dot the island. "It has a sentimental value."

She is hugging a sprout of Sophora toromiro, a tree that was declared extinct in the wild in the 1960s and which scientists have been trying to bring back ever since.

The species grew only on the remote island of Rapa Nui - also known as Easter Island - in the middle of the Pacific. Oral history suggests toromiro wood was used for sacred artefacts and the moai kavakava, small wooden figurines that mimic the large stone faces that overlook the island's slopes.

Over time, archaeological records show, it became popular for construction, firewood and feeding cattle.

Sonia Haoa Cardinali, a local archaeologist, said: "The toromiro must have been one of the last plants left in the community as they faced botanical impoverishment."

By the 1960s it faced extinction in the wild due to overuse and changes in the island's environmental conditions. Invasive species now make up more than 90% of the island's vegetation.