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Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Science I've Seen This Movie. It Doesn't End Well.

Posted by Paul Constant on Tue, Feb 24, 2009 at 2:31 PM

a102/1235513859-fly.jpg Oh, God:

According to the Russian news agency RIA Novosti, a mosquito managed to live 18 months clinging to the outside of the International Space Station, without any food, being bombarded by radiation and enduring fluctuating temperatures ranging from minus 230 degrees to 140 degrees Fahrenheit.

"We brought him back to Earth. He is alive, and his feet are moving," Anatoly Grigoryev of the Russian Academy of Sciences told RIA Novosti.

Also today in science: Surgeons used leeches to reattach a man's hand that was nearly severed in a brutal shark attack.

Comments (19) RSS

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holy fuck, I'm gonna go buy some raid.

Posted by boxofbirds on February 24, 2009 at 2:22 PM

Raid won't do the trick.

http://cgi.horror-asylum.com/news/mansqu…

Posted by Rotten666 on February 24, 2009 at 2:26 PM

science! what the fuck are you trying to do? we are all going to die...you can't cure cancer but you can keep a fucking parasite alive in the vacuum of space...this is bull shit.

Posted by douglas on February 24, 2009 at 2:32 PM

I didn't realize mosquitos lived 18 months on Earth?? I assumed they were like flies, and died after a matter of hours or days. WTF?

Posted by DoubleAgent on February 24, 2009 at 2:36 PM

Sure it's alive. It's FEET are moving!

And Terri Schiavo is smiling.

Posted by w7ngman on February 24, 2009 at 2:38 PM

I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords. I'd like to remind them that as a trusted TV personality, I can be helpful in rounding up others to toil in their underground sugar caves.

Posted by heywhatsit on February 24, 2009 at 2:48 PM

Yeah wikipedia and all the other sources I saw on the net don't seem to believe mosquitoes live 18 mos. That's nuts.

Posted by leek on February 24, 2009 at 2:59 PM

So that's how science works in Russia? They hear about some water bears surviving inadvertant exposure to vacuum, so they send up some other shit and expose it to vacuum too? Just, you know, to see what happens?

Posted by Ben on February 24, 2009 at 3:24 PM

Anything's better than back home in Moscow!

Posted by In Post-Soviet Russia, Mosquito bites you! oh...wait... on February 24, 2009 at 3:39 PM

oddly enough, scientists speculate that Cher and Madonna are both likely to survive the vacuum of space...

Posted by michael strangeways on February 24, 2009 at 3:58 PM

In actual science news on a related topic, male and female mosquitos work to match their buzzing whines until the two create a harmonic overtone, and then they can mate...

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beat…

Posted by just pointin' out on February 24, 2009 at 4:18 PM

@11,

They make beautiful music together. Cool.

Posted by yucca flower on February 24, 2009 at 4:29 PM

@12, it's the first thing that's ever endeared mosquitoes to me

Posted by just pointin' out on February 24, 2009 at 4:33 PM

@ 6 - it's a mosquito... so that would be urban blood farms. AKA THE URBAN ARCHIPELAGO!!!! BUAHAHAHAA!!!

Posted by STJA on February 24, 2009 at 4:54 PM

Has you ever been stung by a dead bee?

Posted by Fifty-Two-Eighty on February 24, 2009 at 5:13 PM

Next the Russians will be cross-breeding mosquitoes with humans for maximum exploitable efficiency. Certainly, Putin wouldn't mind some mosquito DNA to keep him going for till the next century.

Posted by Rick S. on February 24, 2009 at 5:38 PM

NASA needs to get on this shit and send some skeeter eaters up there tout de suite!

Posted by knobtheunicorn on February 25, 2009 at 12:53 AM

@ 17 -- Riiight. Just send an assortment of spiders up there ... and wait to see which ones can find their way back, and what kind of pissed off giant mutants they turn into when they have something to eat besides space-mosquitos again.

Posted by RonK, Seattle on February 25, 2009 at 4:30 PM

@18 I ain't talkin' bout no spiders, I'm talkin' bout skeeter eaters, ya know those big ol'spastic benevolent suckers that look like mosquitos but with like that extra Thurston Moore gene to make them all lanky and cool and shit! Like Bug Angels!

Posted by knobtheunicorn on February 25, 2009 at 10:18 PM