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infodragon [soylentnews.org] writes:

A story of heroism and the ultimate sacrifice during the the 900-day Siege of Leningrad during the Second World War. I think it is safe to say we all benefit from the sacrifice these men made.

https://www.amusingplanet.com/2018/08/the-scientists-who-starved-to-death.html [amusingplanet.com]

As the invading German army poured into the city looting and destroying anything of value, a group of Russian botanists holed up inside the vault of the Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry with a precious collection of seeds and edible plants. This collection, containing seeds from nearly 200,000 varieties of plants of which about a quarter was edible, constituted one of the world’s largest repositories of the genetic diversity of food crops. Among them were plenty of rice, wheat, corn, beans and potatoes, enough to sustain the botanists and see them through the worst days of the siege.

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