What's a Tardigrade?
“Tardigrada”, also known as Tardigrades, water bears, or moss piglets, are eight-legged microscopic creatures that are widely regarded as one of the most resilient creatures ever discovered. They can be found all over the globe in a variety of different habitats – temperate forests, tropical rainforests, deserts, mountaintops, the deep sea, and even the Antarctic. They are small enough to be almost invisible to the naked eye, but large enough to be viewed clearly under a low-powered microscope, making them a favorite of junior scientists. They are technically classified as aquatic, as they require a thin layer of water on their skin to remain hydrated, but in the absence of water, they will curl up into a ball and enter an intense form of hibernation called cryptobiosis. Cryptobiosis allows tardigrades to survive decades in extreme conditions.
Feats of Survival
Tardigrades’ survival skills put Bear Grylls to shame. These little guys can survive from temperatures as low as -328°F and as high as 304°F. They are tolerant of insane pressure changes, radiation levels, and dehydration. They’ve even been launched into the vacuum of space and lived to tell the tale! Well, most of them – Tardigrades are not immortal, and being in a state of cryptobiosis seemed to greatly enhance their survivability after they returned to earth and were rehydrated. Besides their forays into space travel, one of the wildest experiments Tardigrades have survived was being literally shot out of a gun. This lead researchers to calculate that the highest impact speed Tardigrades can survive is about 0.9km/s, about 2-3 times faster than the speed of a passenger plane.
Importance to Mankind
Tardigrades’ feats of survival are not only cool, but could be useful to scientists in multiple different fields. They are relatively easy to raise and breed, so they are ideal candidates for study all around the world. Their resistance to radiation and pressure changes makes them an obvious candidate for space travel research – the properties of cryptobiosis may someday be useful in figuring out how to keep humans alive in space for long periods of time. There is interest in testing the Tardigrades’ abilities to survive on Mars, which could be enlightening for human’s ability to do the same. In addition to outer space, Tardigrades may be used for medical research, namely the preservation of drugs and survivability on the operating table. All of these possibilities are a long ways away, but one thing’s for sure: Tardigrades will certainly be around long enough for us to continue to study and admire them.