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Even then there's a chance a few tardigrades hibernate on some material that shoots up and then comes back a few years later once the earth has cooled a bit.
by sebzim4500 2y ago
Even then there's a chance a few tardigrades hibernate on some material that shoots up and then comes back a few years later once the earth has cooled a bit.
- LeifCarrotson 2y agoI propose we do this intentionally - put a few tardigrades and some other extremophiles in a rad-shielded container inside a fully-passive reentry vehicle and throw it up into a graveyard orbit for a couple million years. Cheap insurance for life on earth!
- pfdietz 2y agoI think they could be cooked by thermal radiation as the ejecta expands.
- sebzim4500 2y agoProbably most would be, but there are a lot of microorganisms and only a few need to get lucky.
- blooalien 2y agoTardigrades were placed in the "extremophile" class with good reason. If anything could survive a truly catastrophic impact event, I'd say the smart money goes on the lowly "water bear" to win. :)
- Keysh 2y agoTardigrades are not "extremophiles", which refers to organisms that live (grow, reproduce) in "extreme" environments ("phile" = "like, love"). Tardigrades can temporarily survive some rather extreme conditions, but they generally require fairly ordinary environments to actually live. (As suggested by common names like "water bear" and "moss piglet".)