It is known that many present-day species of bee maintain a
symbiotic (help one another) relationship with various species
of bacteria of the genus Bacillus within their gut (normal gut
flora for some bees, just as E. coli bacteria are normal members
of our gut flora). It is also known that Bacillus is one genus
of bacteria which can form spores - a kind-of "suspended
animation" special life-form of the microorganism - which allows
survival for many, many years. In fact, the conditions
(temperature and time) required for sterilization of surgical
instruments, etc., inside an autoclave (pressure-cooker) have
been determined by finding under what conditions spores are
killed (please see Better use a pressure cooker!. If spores are
killed, then everything else is also killed). To date, the best-
tested, most well-documented, longest spore survivor is about 70
years (from a sealed tube prepared by the great scientist, Louis
Pasteur, which was opened in 1956). Further, at least
25-million-year-old Bacillus DNA had