World's Largest Genome in a Tiny Fern

What species has the biggest genome? In this video, Alex Dainis explains that the tiny fork fern holds the record at over 160 billion base pairs of DNA. That’s more than 50 times the size of the human genome! She elaborates that long genomes are sometimes the result of rapid population shrinkage, resulting in the loss of biodiversity. Because of this, scientists can study the DNA of the fork fern to gain insights as to how different plant species’ genomes will respond to climate change!