Events in the genome of Welwitschia have given it the ability to survive in an unforgiving desert for thousands of years.

In Afrikaans, the plant is named “tweeblaarkanniedood,” which means “two leaves that cannot die.” The naming is apt: Welwitschia grows only two leaves — and continuously — in a lifetime that can last millenniums.

Its two fibrous leaves, buffeted by dry desert winds and fed on by thirsty animals, become shredded and curled over time, giving Welwitschia a distinctly octopus-like look.

But since it was first discovered, Welwitschia has captivated biologists including Charles Darwin and the botanist Friedrich Welwitsch after whom the plant is named: It is said that when Welwitsch first came across the plant in 1859, “he could do nothing but kneel down on the burning soil and gaze at it, half in fear lest a touch should prove it a figment of the imagination.”.

Jim Leebens-Mack, a plant biologist at the University of Georgia not involved in the study, said it “gives us a foundation for better understanding how Welwitschia does all the crazy stuff that it does.” The Welwitschia genome reflects the plant’s arid and nutrient-poor surroundings.

Approximately 86 million years ago, after a mistake in cell division, the entire Welwitschia genome doubled during a time of increased aridity and prolonged drought in the region — and possibly the formation of the Namib Desert itself, said Tao Wan, a botanist at the Fairy Lake Botanical Garden in Shenzhen, China, and lead author of the study.

But Welwitschia’s original growing tip dies, and leaves instead pour out of a vulnerable area of the plant’s anatomy called the basal meristem, which supplies fresh cells to the growing plant, Dr.

When you encounter two leaves growing in a desert against all odds, kneel down in the burning soil and take a closer look