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List of longest-living organisms

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**Biologically Immortal Organisms:**
– Hydras show no signs of aging.
– Species with constant mortality rates are considered biologically immortal.
– Turritopsis dohrnii can cycle between adult and immature stages indefinitely.
– Skin beetles’ larvae can undergo reversed development multiple times.

**Organisms Revived after Stasis:**
– Bacterial spores have been revived after millions of years of dormancy.
– Microorganisms found in ancient halite crystals could be over 800 million years old.
– Nematodes revived after thousands of years in permafrost.
– Seeds from Judean date palm and Silene stenophylla germinated after long periods.
– Sacred lotus seed dated over 1,000 years old successfully germinated.

**Long-Lived Microorganisms:**
– Endoliths in ocean floor estimated to be millions of years old.
– Actinomycetota in Siberia estimated to be half a million years old.
– Aerobic microorganisms found in sediments up to 101.5 million years old.

**Clonal Plant and Fungal Colonies:**
– Pando, a clonal colony of quaking aspens, is several thousand years old.
– Posidonia oceanica in Spain estimated 12,000-200,000 years old.
– Lomatia tasmanica in Tasmania estimated 43,600 years old.
– Jurupa Oak colony in California estimated 13,000 years old.

**Long-Lived Aquatic and Terrestrial Organisms:**
– Glass sponges in East China Sea and Southern Ocean estimated over 10,000 years old.
– Methuselah, a Great Basin bristlecone pine in California, 4,855 years old.
– Red sea urchins can live over 200 years.
– Aldabra giant tortoise Adwaita died at 255 years.
– Jeanne Calment lived to 122 years, 164 days.

This is a list of the longest-living biological organisms: the individual(s) (or in some instances, clones) of a species with the longest natural maximum life spans. For a given species, such a designation may include:

  1. The oldest known individual(s) that are currently alive, with verified ages.
  2. Verified individual record holders, such as the longest-lived human, Jeanne Calment, or the longest-lived domestic cat, Creme Puff.

The definition of "longest-living" used in this article considers only the observed or estimated length of an individual organism's natural lifespan – that is, the duration of time between its birth or conception, or the earliest emergence of its identity as an individual organism, and its death – and does not consider other conceivable interpretations of "longest-living", such as the length of time between the earliest appearance of a species in the fossil record and the present (the historical "age" of the species as a whole), the time between a species' first speciation and its extinction (the phylogenetic "lifespan" of the species), or the range of possible lifespans of a species' individuals. This list includes long-lived organisms that are currently still alive as well as those that are dead.

Determining the length of an organism's natural lifespan is complicated by many problems of definition and interpretation, as well as by practical difficulties in reliably measuring age, particularly for extremely old organisms and for those that reproduce by asexual cloning. In many cases the ages listed below are estimates based on observed present-day growth rates, which may differ significantly from the growth rates experienced thousands of years ago. Identifying the longest-living organisms also depends on defining what constitutes an "individual" organism, which can be problematic, since many asexual organisms and clonal colonies defy one or both of the traditional colloquial definitions of individuality (having a distinct genotype and having an independent, physically separate body). Additionally, some organisms maintain the capability to reproduce through very long periods of metabolic dormancy, during which they may not be considered "alive" by certain definitions but nonetheless can resume normal metabolism afterward; it is unclear whether the dormant periods should be counted as part of the organism's lifespan.

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