nuclear-news

Will cockroaches really inherent the post-nuclear war world?

Radiation & Roaches, Shortening & Oil San Diego READER By Matthew Alice  Jan. 20, 2010 “…………Roaches can withstand much more radiation than people can. But fruit flies and flour beetles and a particular kind of wasp will be around long after roaches are gone.

Radiation damages DNA, which is what eventually kills things that haven’t already been frizzled by the heat released by a nuclear explosion. Humans have much more DNA than roaches, and human cells replicate faster, which is the point at which a cell is vulnerable to radiation. The slow-moving roach DNA is less likely to be damaged. DNA damage eventually does in the human. Humans also live longer than roaches, so there’s more time for bad DNA to have an effect………..

So, if roaches won’t inherit the earth, what will? If we finally nuke the globe to shreds, we will nuke ourselves back to the age of protozoa, bacteria, mosses, and algae. They’ve been zapped with more than a million rads and survived. But it doesn’t sound half as alarming to say that after we drop the big one, the only thing left will be moss……..”

San Diego Reader | Radiation & Roaches, Shortening & Oil

January 21, 2010 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 2 WORLD, weapons and war | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear weapons, radiation, radioactive