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(MENAFN – Gulf Times) After all, there may be a life on the moon: thousands of virtually indestructible creatures capable of withstanding extreme radiation, burning heat, the coldest temperatures in the universe and decades without food.
These terrifying beings are not aliens, but microscopic Earthlings known as tardigrades, who probably survived after a crash on the lunar surface by the Israeli probe Beresheet in April, the organization said on Tuesday. American responsible for their trip. .
On the basis of an badysis of the trajectory of the spacecraft and the composition of the device in which the micro-animals were stored, "we believe that the survival chances of the tardigrades are extremely high, Nova Spivack, co-founder and President of the Arch Mission Foundation, I said.
This non-profit organization is dedicated to providing backup copies of human knowledge and Earth's biology through the solar system, a quest that appears to be the creation of an Encyclopedia Galactica evoked for the first time by sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov.
"The tardigrades are ideal to include because they are microscopic, multicellular and are one of the most sustainable life forms on the planet Earth," said Spivack.
He added that the smaller creatures, whose size is less than one millimeter, had been dehydrated to place them in suspended animation, then locked in an artificial amber epoxy, and should be reactivatable in the future.
The tardigrades were stored in a lunar library, a nanotechnology device that looks like a DVD and contains an archive of 30 million pages of human history viewable under microscopes, as well as its human DNA.
Spivack is confident that this impact has also survived – but it does not represent the first genetic code or the first life forms to be deposited on the sterile celestial body.
This distinction belongs to the DNA and microbes contained in nearly 100 bags of excrement and urine left by American astronauts during Apollo lunar landings from 1969 to 1972.
Also known as water cubs or moss pigs, tardigrades can live in water or on dry land, and are able to survive temperatures up to 150 degrees Celsius and as low as minus 272 degrees Celsius, although for a few minutes.
The eight-legged larval-like animals can come back after being dried for decades in a lifeless envelope, withstand almost zero pressure in the space and crushing depths of the Marianas Trench.
If they did not burn during an explosion, they could in theory survive the minimal pressure on the lunar surface and at extreme temperatures, said William Miller, an expert lateigrades at Baker University.
"But to become active, to grow, to eat and to reproduce, they would need water, air and food, so that it would not be possible for them to multiply and to form a colony, "he added.
Cbadie Conley, an astrobiologist at NASA, said their survival time would depend on the site's state of impact and the temperatures at which they would be exposed.
"If they do not heat up too much, it's possible that they can survive long enough (several years)," she said.
"I would be more concerned that animals would be affected by toxic chemicals from the epoxy or glue used to store them, as opposed to the conditions of the space," she said. added.
Even though the creatures have survived for several years, there is no crewed mission on the Moon planned before the Artemis program of NASA in 2024 at the South Pole, far from the place of Beresheet crash on the sea of serenity. They will probably not go home. .
"It is unlikely that they will be saved in time, so I guess even if they survived, they are doomed to failure, Rafael Alves Batista, physicist at the University of Sao Paulo and co-author of a 2017 article on the extreme resistance of tardigrades, I said.
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