tardigrade
Sign in to saveTardigrades (), also known as water bears or moss piglets, are a phylum of eight-legged segmented micro-animals. They were first described by the German zoologist Johann August Ephraim Goeze in 1773, who called them ' . In 1776, the Italian biologist Lazzaro Spallanzani named them Tardigrada', which means 'slow walkers'.
AI overview
Tardigrades, also known as water bears or moss piglets, are tiny eight-legged creatures that belong to their own phylum of micro-animals. These microscopic organisms were first identified in 1773 and named "Tardigrada" (meaning "slow walkers") in 1776, establishing them as a recognized group in the animal kingdom.
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Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- taxon
- Subclass of
- micro-animal
- Parent taxon
- Tactopoda
- Image
- SEM image of Milnesium tardigradum in active state - journal.pone.0045682.g001-2.png
Show 2 more facts
- P105
- phylum
via Wikidata · CC0
Article
24 sectionsContents
- Description
- Body structure
- Nervous system and senses
- Locomotion
- Feeding and excretion
- Reproduction and life cycle
- Ecology and life history
- Environmental tolerance
- Dehydrated 'tun' state
- Surviving other stresses
- Exposure to space
- Damage protection proteins
- Taxonomic history
- Evolution
- Evolutionary history
- Genomics
- Phylogeny
- In culture and society
- Early 20th century beginnings
- Popularity
- From science to popular culture
- See also
- References
- External links
Tardigrades (), also known as water bears or moss piglets, are a phylum of eight-legged segmented micro-animals. They were first described by the German zoologist Johann August Ephraim Goeze in 1773, who called them ' . In 1776, the Italian biologist Lazzaro Spallanzani named them Tardigrada', which means 'slow walkers'.
Tardigrades live in diverse regions of Earth's biospheremountaintops, the deep sea, tropical rainforests, and the Antarctic. They are among the most resilient animals known, with individual species able to survive severe conditions, such as exposure to extreme temperatures, extreme pressures (both high and low), air deprivation, radiation, dehydration, and starvation – that would quickly kill most other forms of life. Tardigrades have survived exposure to outer space.