Send tardigrades to neighboring star systems? Tardigrades are capable of surviving all kinds of extreme environments. Their “superpowers” allow them to survive enormous pressures, temperatures as cold as -200 ºC or as hot as 150 ºC. The bottom of the ocean, at a very high altitude… nothing seems to affect them, as they are able to survive in a wide range of temperatures and environments. They even withstand the vacuum of space. Of course, to resist these conditions, tardigrades resort to cryptobiosis, which is how the ability of living beings to remain in a quasivive state is known.
Now, a study suggests that we could send these very special creatures in spacecraft weighing 1 gram accelerated by powerful lasers that would allow them, for example, to reach the closest star to the Sun, Proxima Centauri, in less than a quarter of a century. . Sending tardigrades into space could be used to study the effects of fast interstellar travel on life forms.
The biggest challenge for human-scale interstellar travel is the enormous distance between Earth and the closest stars. If we were to send a spacecraft to the nearest star, it would take more than 80,000 years to reach it.
But there would be a way to experiment with space exploration.
Logically, this type of mission could only be carried out by organisms that are tolerant to radiation and that can enter stasis, such as tardigrades and C. elegans, a type of worm that is often used in scientific research.
“We can examine their metabolism, physiology, neurological function, reproduction and aging,” says Joel Rothman of UC Santa Barbara and co-author of the paper. “Most of the experiments that can be done with these animals in a laboratory can be done aboard the StarChips as they travel through the cosmos. We could start thinking about designing interstellar carriers, whatever they are, in a way that can improve the problems that are detected in these tiny animals.
The basic project to develop a roadmap for achieving such a flight through directed energy propulsion is supported by NASA and private foundations such as the Starlight program and by Breakthrough Initiatives such as the Starshot program.
Should we deliberately send terrestrial life out into the cosmos to spread to other worlds?
What about the welfare of the tardigrades themselves? These are questions that arise from this approach that would put on the table what is called directed panspermia.
Referencia: “Interstellar space biology via Project Starlight” by Stephen Lantin, Sophie Mendell, Ghassan Akkad, Alexander N. Cohen, Xander Apicella, Emma McCoy, Eliana Beltran-Pardo, Michael Waltemathe, Prasanna Srinivasan, Pradeep M. Joshi, Joel H. Rothman and Philip Lubin, 15 October 2021, Acta Astronautica.
DOI: 10.1016/j.actaastro.2021.10.009
