These beasties were sent to the moon aboard an Israeli spacecraft. However, the probe crashed and it’s now feared the virtually indestructible creatures have broken loose and are running riot across a small area of the lunar surface.
You need to be pretty tough to survive here on Earth – but even tougher to make it on the moon.
These beasties are called tardigrades, or water bears, and were sent to the moon aboard an Israeli spacecraft in a state of suspended animation. ‘We believe the chances of survival for the tardigrades…are extremely high,’ Nova Spivack, founder of the Arch Mission Foundation, told AFP.The foundation is dedicated to spreading ‘back-ups’ of human knowledge and Earth’s biology throughout the Solar System in a bid to create an ‘Encyclopedia Galactica’,“Tardigrades are ideal to include because they are microscopic, multicellular, and one of the most durable forms of life on planet Earth,’ Spivack added.
Tardigrades can live in water or land and are capable of surviving temperatures as high as 150 degrees Celsius or as low as minus 272 degrees Celsius for short period of time.
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