Tardigrade-obsessed: meet the researchers trying to turn water bears into neuroscience models

Tardigrade-obsessed: meet the researchers trying to turn water bears into neuroscience models

For water-bear enthusiasts, it’s the creature’s legs that make it stand out. For water-bear enthusiasts, it’s the creature’s legs that make it stand out.

Meet The Researchers Trying To Turn Water Bears Into Neuroscience Models - Data Intelligence

There’s no two ways about it: tardigrades are badass. These eight-legged, microscopic water-dwellers have survived the vacuum of space, extreme dehydration, and temperatures ranging from near absolute zero to above boiling point. In 2021, researchers fired frozen tardigrades from a gun onto a target several metres away, to simulate a meteorite impact, and showed that they lived to tell the tale1. Tardigrades are also transparent, skin-shedding a…