At Michigan State University, some discoveries take decades — even centuries — to unfold. The university’s roster of long-term projects and experiments range from buried seeds that have sprouted nearly a century and a half later to a decades-old twin registry that is helping researchers make new discoveries about health and psychology. Spartan researchers are committed to examining a wide range of topics that help us better understand the world.

It started with a simple question: How long can seeds stay alive underground?

In 1879, botany professor William Beal buried 20 glass bottles filled with sand and seeds from a variety of weed species on MSU’s campus. The goal of the experiment was to understand seed longevity in the soil — a topic of general importance in ecology, restoration, conservation and agriculture — by digging up one bottle every 20 years to test whether the seeds would still germinate. And 146 years later, MSU is still learning from the experiment.

In 2023, more than two years after the 16th bottle of seeds was excavated from a secret location, molecular genetic testing confirmed a hybrid plant was accidentally included among the seeds in the bottle — a discovery that would have surprised and amazed Beal because the structure of DNA was unknown at the time.