Tardigrade Cryptobiosis: Tun Formation and Vitrification

This simulator renders a stylized tardigrade whose body contracts into the characteristic "tun" shape as it loses water, while hundreds of instanced biomolecules inside its body track a real glass-transition model. Water content drains under a controllable desiccation rate; the Gordon-Taylor equation combines that water content with a trehalose/CAHS protective-solute level to estimate the mixture's glass-transition temperature, which is compared live against an adjustable ambient temperature. When the ambient temperature drops below the glass-transition temperature, molecular mobility collapses toward zero and the internal biomolecules visibly freeze in place and shift from amber to cyan — the vitrified, protected state that lets real tardigrades survive years of near-total desiccation. Rehydration reverses the whole process.