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Bear Trap: Finding Tardigrades (continued)
• They also have another defense for when they are in water. When the water they live in is low on oxygen, they will stretch
out and allow their metabolic rate to reduce. In this state, their muscles absorb oxygen and water well enough that they can
survive. https://www.livescience.com/57985-tardigrade-facts.html
Types of extreme environments they have been known to survive:
• Temperatures as low as -200 °C (-328 °F) and as high as 151 °C (304 °F);
• Freezing and/or thawing processes;
• Changes in salinity;
• Lack of oxygen;
• Lack of water;
• Levels of X-ray radiation 1000x the lethal human dose;
• Some noxious chemicals;
• Boiling alcohol;
• Low pressure of a vacuum;
• High pressure (up to 6x the pressure of the deepest part of the ocean).
• Most common cryptobiosis
– Cryobiosis (low temperature)
– Osmobiosis (increased solute concentration, such as salt water)
– Anoxybiosis (lack of oxygen)
– Anhydrobiosis (lack of water)
Tardigrades and gene technology:
Understanding how tardigrades repair their DNA and protect their cells in extreme conditions could have applications in tissue
preservation or other forms of biotechnology such as medicine and agriculture.
