The Tardigrade ; A Model for astrobiological studies

Horikawa, Daiki*; Kunieda, Takekazu*; Abe, Wataru*; Koshikawa, Shigeyuki*; Nakahara, Yuichi*; Watanabe, Masahiko*; Iwata, Kenichi*; Sakashita, Tetsuya; Hamada, Nobuyuki*; Higashi, Seigo*; et al.

no journal, , 

We report the first successful rearing of the herbivorous tardigrade, , by supplying a green alga as a food. The reared individuals of this species had an anhydrobiotic capacity throughout their life cycle, from eggs, to juveniles, and to adults. Reared adults, while in an anhydrobiotic state, were tolerant to temperatures -196C and 100C. Furthermore, they were shown to be tolerant to the exposure to 99.8% acetonitrile, 1 GPa of hydrostatic pressure, or 5000 Gy of He ion radiation. We will report the details of these results, along with the description of their life history. Due to the observed tolerance to such extreme environmental conditions, we propose R. varieornatus to be included as a suitable model for astrobiological studies of multicellular organisms.