Transcriber: Helen Chang Reviewer: Rhonda Jacobs
What do you think are the strongest creatures in the world?
I’ll let you have a think.
Animals like these
are ones I can imagine came into your head.
And if you said bear, you’re right,
not quite this type of bear,
but a water bear that looks like this
under a microscope.
I know you may think that these animals resemble an alien,
but I can almost guarantee
that each and every one of you has been around this weird creature
that almost looks like this fictional character from Alice in Wonderland.
Today, I’m going to be talking to you about how these creatures
can help solve some of today’s problems.
Water bears are close to microscopic animals with thick, segmented body,
eight legs and flattened heads.
I guess by the way I’ve described them, they sound kind of cute,
when in reality, as you can see,
they’re slightly terrifying.
They can also be seen with the naked eye,
however, not in much detail after all, as they’re only one millimeter long.
Water bears have many names, each used for different situations,
so scientists would refer to them as tardigrades;
they’re most commonly known as water bears.
And if you want a name that just makes them sound extra cute,
they can be called moss piglets.
One of the things that makes them so fascinating
is they have survived all five mass extinctions on Earth,
as the oldest extinction was 440 million years ago,
and water bears are 600 million years old,
making them older [than] dinosaurs by around 400 million years.
There are around 1,300 known water bear species, each with different superpowers.
And although they can go up to 30 years without food or water,
they have a slightly bizarre way of eating.
What they do is they suck the fluids from cells and plants like fungi and algae
by puncturing the cell wall with needle-like mouthparts
and hoovering up the liquid inside.
As there are so many different types of water bears,
some can even munch on entire living organisms.
Now, although that might sound like a scene in a sci-fi movie,
it is genuinely what happens.
Water bears typically live in places
that provide a thin layer of water around their bodies,
such as mosses or lichens.
But this leads me onto
why I’m actually giving you a TED Talk on these weird little organisms.
Water bears can survive anywhere - and I mean anywhere -
volcanoes, lavas, desert, Arctic glaciers,
huge amounts of radiation and even space.
They can literally live in the vacuum of space for years and years.
The way these superhuman creatures survive these extreme conditions
is by entering a death-like state called anhydrobiosis.
Now, I know that sounds super sciency,
but all it means is that they squeeze 95% of water from their body,
retract their heads and legs into their body, roll up and become dormant.
In this state, they’re known as a “tun,” which looks like this.
When they’re in a tun state,
water bear metabolic activity drops drastically,
and all of its cells are protected by damage by water soluble proteins
known as “tardigrade disordered proteins,” or TPD.
When water bears squeeze every bit of water from their body,
the TPD molecules form a tough cocoon around the cells
to protect them from damage.
Tuns can be revived even after decades have passed,
and scientists have managed to revive water bears that have been in a tun state
for 30 and 120 years, simply by placing them into water.
And the life span of a constantly hydrated water bear
is only around a few months.
This leads me on to why all of these superpowers can actually help us out.
Experts believe that they can genetically modify human DNA with water bear DNA
to help astronauts withstand the deadly effects of long distance space travel.
One of the huge issues with space travel
is that when astronauts actually travel to space,
they experience 700 times the radiation that they would do on Earth.
As you can imagine, that’s not great for the human body to withstand
even with an astronaut suit on.
NASA scientist, Chris Mason,
believes that if one day humans decide to colonize other planets,
we will need to be able to adapt our bodies
to cope with the harsh conditions we find on these strange new worlds.
So, he took this belief even further
and decided to genetically modify human DNA with water bear DNA
to create a hybrid super human cell.
And in some ways, this actually worked.
When Mason fired heavy radiation at both the normal human cell
and the super human cell,
he found an 80% reduction in DNA damage in the super human cell.
This piece of evidence shows we can use water bear genes
to help us to adapt to more extreme environments,
which hugely broadens the horizon to what humans can withstand and do,
and even makes it seem more and more likely
that our grandchildren may end up on Mars.
Not only can it help astronauts
or any future human who’s looking to go to Mars,
it can help grow crops in extreme environments, just like the one on Mars.
Helping to grow food in extreme environments
helps solve a whole other issue of where crops can actually grow.
Because if crops can grow in extreme temperatures,
then we’ll be able to harness more land on Earth to grow food,
such as the Sahara Desert.
I mean, imagine going to a supermarket,
picking up an apple and find out it was being picked from a tree
in the Sahara Desert.
Besides this,
it can even help protect workers
from extreme radiation in nuclear facilities
or even stop doctors and dentists running out of the room
when they give you an X-ray.
Anyway, one of the last thoughts that I’m going to leave you with
about this genetic modification
is that it will be able to help combat the effects of radiation
on healthy human cells during cancer treatments on Earth.
So, as you can see, these magical creatures are already on their way
to solving some major issues that scientists have today.
If we can already harness one of those water bear superpowers,
of their immunity to radiation, what else are we able to do with them?
Maybe the biggest problems in the world can be solved with very small packages.
Thank you.
(Applause) (Cheers)