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Published online 8 September 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2008.1087
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Spacesuits optional for 'water bears'
Tiny invertebrates are the first animals to withstand the vacuum and radiation of space.
It's one small step for water bears, one giant leap for animal-kind. Tiny animals called tardigrades — better known as water-bears — have become the first animals to survive the cruel vacuum, intense cold and radiation of space without a spacesuit.
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Maybe I didn't understand something but Ingemar Jönsson is a man: http://www.hkr.se/templates/Page____4571.aspx Why did you write: "...and her colleagues figured it would be the water bears"?
Ingemar was a man last time I met her.
The pup fish in Death Valley may be another specimen that could similarily survive. They go into hybernation during the summer months in heats that reach over 100F. They get a good dose of UV. H.D. Wolpert Director of Engineering Bio-Optics 1933 Comstock Ave Los Angeles CA (90025) (310)277-3859 wolpert.bio-optics@dslextreme.com
The Genome of these animals, water bears and others such as pup fish and microbes living in extreme conditions should be sequenced. It would reveal a lot about disease and environmental resistance that would be useful for human health
what amazing animal !
perhaps we can do some research on water bears,the "clothes" or something maybe useful!haha