AT HOME IN SPACE

Of all environments, space is the most hostile to living things. It's freezing cold, close to absolute zero (although space itself has no temperature) and there's no atmosphere or much of anything else. (I tell the kids in the Planetarium "Space is empty; that's why they call it 'space'") It's also chock full of lethal radiation. Space may be a nice place but you not only wouldn't want to live there, you couldn't! Hence, the space suits and the space ships. But researchers have recently discovered something astounding. Tardigrades can survive exposure to open-space vacuum, cold and radiation.

Tardigrades are tiny invertebrate animals from 0.1 to 1.5mm in size that can be easily found on wet lichens and mosses. Because their environments often lose moisture, tardigrades are very resistant to drying out and can be resurrected after years of desiccation. Tardigrades are also amazingly resistant to heat, cold and radiation -so water bears seemed like an ideal animal to test in space.

Desiccated water bears were launched aboard a European Space Agency spacecraft last year and they were exposed to the awful vacuum of space. When their capsule was returned to Earth, researchers were amazed to discover that most of the little animals had survived their exposure to vacuum and cosmic rays. But the scientists were really surprised to discover that some of them had even survived exposure to deadly levels of solar UV radiation, which are more than 1000 times higher than on the surface of the Earth. And not only did the little fellows survive; they even made more water bears after their safe return.

There's been speculation for years that life may have originated somewhere else and made the trip to Earth. But most of that speculation has involved unicellular animals or bacteria. Tardigrades are complex multicellular little beasts and if they can survive the rigors of space unprotected, the 'life came from elsewhere' people have just got a big shot in the arm.

And by the way, if you want to know what a tardigrade looks like in profile; just look at a map of Saipan. The outline is a pretty good representation of a water bear.

Tardigrades are common but aren't observed very often because they're so small. They aren't the dominant life form of planet Earth either. That honor belongs not to humans, but to insects, both in bulk and in sheer numbers. Although some insects are as small as water bears, most of them are large enough to be visible and although there are many uncataloged insects in the world, scientists were NOT expecting to discover a brand new insect where they found it.

IN YOUR OWN BACK YARD

If you're a research scientist, you expect to find new insects when you go on expedition to the wilds of Africa or Papua New Guinea, but you do not expect to find one in the wildlife garden of your own museum, but that's exactly what happened to British scientists earlier this year.

The bug was discovered living in the Natural History Museum's Wildlife Garden and was first seen on Museum grounds in March 2007 on the seeds of some of the plane trees that grow there. The almond-shaped bug is red and black and about the size of a grain of rice. The little guy is baffling insect experts at the Museum who are still trying to identify their mystery guest.

The bug appears to be harmless, but there is potential for it to spread throughout the UK. The insects in the Museum grounds increased in numbers so quickly that by August 2007 it was the most common insect in the Wildlife Garden.

Experts checked their visitor with those in the Museum's national insect collection of more than 28 million specimens and amazingly, there is no exact match. The little bug closely resembles the fairly rare species Arocatus roeselii, usually found in central Europe. But the European roeselii bugs are brighter red than this new bug and they are usually associated with alder trees and not plane trees.

It just goes to prove that you don't have to go to exotic locals to make some astounding discoveries!

So, what are scientists to do to save themselves the embarrassment of discovering new insects right in their own back yard? Well, back in the old US of A, the good folks at the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) have decided that the solution might be found in a database.

NAMING THE NAMES

Distinguishing between harmful and helpful insects starts with ironclad identification. So Agricultural Research Service (ARS) entomologist Chris Thompson has headed up efforts to accurately identify and name almost 157,000 species in the order Diptera. But you and I don't call them Diptera. We call them flies, gnats, midges and mosquitoes.

The order Diptera is one of the four largest groups of living organisms on Earth, and its members are critical components in virtually all non-marine ecosystems. Carl Linnaeus, who devised the scientific classification system still in use today, compiled the first index of Diptera species names in 1758. But even though an average of 800 new Diptera names are proposed every year, the nomenclature has not been comprehensively updated since 1805.

The ARS group has assembled a massive index that contains nomenclature data for 156,599 living and extinct Diptera species in 154 families and 11,671 genera-around 10 percent of the known biodiversity in the world today.The ARS group has assembled a massive index that contains nomenclature data for 156,599 living and extinct Diptera species in 154 families and 11,671 genera-around 10 percent of the known biodiversity in the world today.

Their research, which is available at http://www.diptera.org, has two components. The Nomenclator allows users to check names, confirm species status, and obtain information about type, family classification and sources for all names in the collection. The Species database is being designed to answer queries about different species, including their distribution, biological associates and economic importance.

Scientists (and other interested parties) can obtain a wealth of information that will help them track the migrations, increases and declines of economically-important Diptera species worldwide.

Know your flies!! Visit www.diptera.org today!!

So, if you're now feeling overwhelmingly outnumbered, not to mention significantly unprepared for the rigors of space, how about feeling really really young. Humans have been on Earth in their present form for maybe 200,000 years. Scientists have recently come across the earliest known remains of one of my favorite animals. No, it's not a insect, but you're all very familiar with it, trust me.

The ARS group has assembled a massive index that contains nomenclature data for 156,599 living and extinct Diptera species in 154 families and 11,671 genera-around 10 percent of the known biodiversity in the world today.The ARS group has assembled a massive index that contains nomenclature data for 156,599 living and extinct Diptera species in 154 families and 11,671 genera-around 10 percent of the known biodiversity in the world today.