
Tardigrades turn into glass when they dry out - DiabloD3
http://www.sciencealert.com/water-bears-turn-into-glass-when-they-dry-out
======
zhte415
For those needing to look up what Tardigrades are:

From Wikipedia:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade)

> Tardigrades are notable for being perhaps the most durable of known
> organisms; they are able to survive extreme conditions that would be rapidly
> fatal to nearly all other known life forms. They can withstand temperature
> ranges from −272.222 °C (−458.000 °F) to 149 °C (300 °F),[7] pressures about
> six times greater than those found in the deepest ocean trenches, ionizing
> radiation at doses hundreds of times higher than the lethal dose for a
> human, and the vacuum of outer space.[8] They can go without food or water
> for more than 10 years, drying out to the point where they are 3% or less
> water, only to rehydrate, forage, and reproduce.

~~~
api_or_ipa
It's frustrating that Wikipedia editors ignore sig figs. [7] is a wired.com
source which quotes 458F (3 sig figs) and thus should be converted to 272C.
The quoted 300F is even more suspect, since it's a nicely rounded number.

~~~
dllu
Considering that -272 C is very close to absolute zero, it makes perfect
sense. For example, 0.1 K and 0.5 K are both written as -273 C, but the latter
is five times as hot as the former. For best consistency, we ought to use
logarithmic Kelvins.

~~~
gajomi
I don't really disagree, but that would make for a rather perverse unit, given
that inverse temperatures are already on a logarithm scale relative to the
probabilities of microscopic states.

~~~
labster
Logarithms are like violence—if it's not flat yet, you need to use more.

------
ChuckMcM
It is fortunate these things are so small, if they were the size of a small
dog they would scare the crap out of me. An unkillable eating machine.

~~~
guard-of-terra
Without spine they won't be able to function at that size. Gravitation is mean
bitch - weight grows as x^3, but muscular power only as x^2. Mammals are
probably the best you can do in "very large" form factor.

Indeed, even at their present size they are called "slow steppers".

~~~
GFK_of_xmaspast
On the other hand, actual biology:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coconut_crab](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coconut_crab)
(and re: the "mammals" comment:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentinosaurus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentinosaurus))

~~~
DiabloD3
"Video of the most likely way Argentinosaurus walked" -> _Very_ carefully.

------
jdnier
So why/how does an animal evolve to survive hard vacuum and lethal ionizing
radiation when you can't experience those conditions here (on Earth)?

~~~
adrianm
This is an argument for panspermia according to Neil deGrasse Tyson. (Real
Time with Bill Maher, S13E29)

~~~
dclowd9901
I was going to say the same thing. Such a hardy species I would think would be
the product of an incredible amount of evolutionary progress. How do they fit
in with the rest of the living species taxonomy?

~~~
lifeisstillgood
Don't get too excited - the Wikipedia article (very good) explores their
genome and taxonomy. Fossilised records hard to come by but cambrian and
Cretaceous records have been found. So probably boringly terrestrial

~~~
babuskov
Or it could simply mean that they came to Earth a long time ago.

~~~
iSnow
Sure, but as of now, there is no positive indication they are
extraterrestrial. They fit into the species cladogram, they don't seem to
suddenly appear as a time anomaly, they just seem like extremely tough little
guys.

------
jamesfisher
> capable of surviving ... prolonged desiccation and near-100 percent water
> loss

Aren't they the same thing?

~~~
marcosdumay
One is prolonged, the other is intense.

------
derefr
So, any chance of this particular kind of auto-vitrification could work as a
preservation method for human cells, alternative to cryopreservation or
plastination?

------
dang
Url changed from [http://www.hexapolis.com/2015/12/23/new-research-shows-
that-...](http://www.hexapolis.com/2015/12/23/new-research-shows-that-water-
bears-turn-into-glass-when-drying-out/), which points to this.

------
stefantalpalaru
The title reads like a Radio Yerevan joke: they don't "turn into", they are
"covered in", and it's not glass, it's protein.

~~~
Someone
It's not glass, but it may be _a_ glass.
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass):

 _" Scientifically, the term "glass" is often defined in a broader sense,
encompassing every solid that possesses a non-crystalline (that is, amorphous)
structure at the atomic scale and that exhibits a glass transition when heated
towards the liquid state."_

Polystyrene is a glass, for example
([https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_transition](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_transition))

------
confiscate
Tardigrades rule!

