Under a slice-of-heaven sky, 150 acres of rolling green hills stretch off into the distance. About a dozen people—tree enthusiasts, conservationists, research biologists, biotech entrepreneurs, and a venture capitalist in long socks and a floppy hat—have driven to this rural spot in New York state on a perfect late-July day.

[They] are here to see more than 2,500 transgenic chestnut seedlings at a seed farm belonging to American Castanea, a new biotech startup. The sprouts, no higher than our knees, are samples of likely the first genetically modified trees to be considered for federal regulatory approval as a tool for ecological restoration. American Castanea’s founders, and all the others here today, hope that the American chestnut (Castanea dentata) will be the first tree species ever brought back from functional extinction—but, ideally, not the last.

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Nothing like this has ever been tried before. But the self-­proclaimed “nutheads” believe the reintroduction of a GMO, blight-resistant American chestnut at scale could also become a model for how environmentalists can redeploy trees in general: restoring forests and shifting food production, all to combat climate change and biodiversity loss.

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