Constantly Sci-Tracked

Tardigrades, better known as water bears, are small gummy-bear like animals that seem to have won the game of life. These little guys can survive just about anything, from Antarctica to hot springs, and outer-space to the Mariana trench. Honestly it would be quicker to write a list of the few things they can't survive than it would be to tell you all the things they can survive, but it would also sound much less impressive so I'm not going to do that. The indestructible gummy bear (tardigrades). Image credit: Willow Gabriel, Goldstein Lab ( Wikimedia Commons ) So what can they survive? Instead of telling you that now, I might first explain HOW they survive. You'd be forgiven for thinking that because tardigrades can survive so many different things they must have an entire repertoire of extreme survival tricks (like being Batman). But the truth is that they have one trick that just seems to work against everything (more like being Hawkeye, exc...

Ok don’t start panicking, it’s not like that lobster you gulfed down last night is slowly nipping its way out.   The immortal crustacean - Don't worry, he's never going to come nipping out of your belly after a lobster dinner. Image credit: U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ( Wikimedia Commons ) You see they aren’t exactly “immortal” per se, they can still die, they just don’t exactly age like you and I. We grow up and reach our prime, then it all starts going downhill (my back is already trying to tell me I'm old). Lobsters reach their prime, and then grow to a bigger , better (and more fertile ) prime. I’m guessing you all want to know their secret by now, right? It’s all thanks to a nifty little enzyme known as telomerase. But before I talk about that, I might just start by taking a step back and telling you about these little things called telomeres (the smart ones among you may have noticed a similarity with the names. Don’t worry I’ll...