Israel Aerospace Industries had a lunar lander the "Beresheet" attempting to be the first private moon lander to land on the moon, instead crashed on the moon. Leaving a wreckage trail of possible Alien life to thrive on the moons harsh surface? Tardigrades!! One of the Most evolved/durable creatures on earth.....
The Beresheet carried a lunar library consisting of 25 layers of nickel, each only a few microns thick. The first four layers contain roughly 60,000 high-resolution images of book pages, which include language primers, textbooks, and keys to decoding the other 21 layers. Those layers hold nearly all of the English Wikipedia, thousands of classic books, and even the secrets to David Copperfield’s magic tricks. Another thin layer of epoxy resin between each layer of nickel, a synthetic equivalent of the fossilized tree resin that preserves ancient insects. Into the resin they tucked hair follicles and blood samples from 24 humans that represent a diverse genetic cross-section of human ancestry, in addition to some dehydrated tardigrades and samples from major holy sites, like the Bodhi tree in India. A few thousand extra dehydrated tardigrades were sprinkled onto tape that was attached to the lunar library.
Tardigrades could hypothetically be revived in the future. Tardigrades are known to enter dormant states in which all metabolic processes stop and the water in their cells is replaced by a protein that effectively turns the cells into glass. Scientists have revived tardigrades that have spent up to 10 years in this dehydrated state, although in some cases they may be able to survive much longer without water. Although the lunar library is designed to last for millions of years, scientists are just beginning to understand how tardigrades manage to survive in so many unforgiving environments. It’s conceivable that as we learn more about tardigrades, we’ll discover ways to rehydrate them after much longer periods of dormancy.
I wondered why they added the Lunar Library to a lunar lander in the first place? The Lead Scientist Spivack “Their job, as a backup of this planet, make sure that we protect our heritage, both our knowledge and our biology, We have to plan for their worst nightmare.” Making a backup of the entire planet is the sort of high-minded idealism associated with the titans of US Government/NASA, but Spivack is well on his way to turning it into a reality. And as the world grapples with the fallout from climate change, the prospect of nuclear war, and even killer asteroids, creating a backup of human civilization doesn’t sound like such a bad idea after all.
Who Knows......in 10 years what species those Tardigrades will evolve into trying to survive in the harsh moon environment......!!
Stay Safe and Frosty....
Peace....
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