How did water bears get so hardy? Secrets of tardigrade evolution revealed in new fossil analysis

At first glance, the microscopic creatures known as tardigrades don't appear that hardy. "Before our publication, we only know how two of these fossils are related to living tardigrades," the study's corresponding author, Dr. Marc A. Mapalo from Harvard University's Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, told Salon. "Currently, the science indicates that water bears have several modes of cryptobiosis, including responses to lack of water, high salinity or osmotic pressure, the presence of reactive chemicals, freezing temperatures, among others," Dr. Derrick R. J. Kolling, a chemist at Marshall University who was not involved in the study, told Salon. Learning from water bears could also help humans with "knowledge of preserving/restoring cell membranes" and thereby "help prolong the shelf-life of medications such as antibiotics so they could save human lives." "Although this application would be in the distant future, protecting human DNA and proteins from the inhospitable conditions — notably, cosmic radiation — of space would make travel away from Earth more feasible," Kolling said.