Like escape artists, rotifers elude enemies by drying up and — poof! — they are gone with the wind

They haven’t had sex in some 30 million years, but some very small invertebrates named bdelloid rotifers are still shocking biologists — they should have gone extinct long ago. Researchers have discovered the secret to their evolutionary longevity: these rotifers are microscopic escape artists. When facing pathogens, they dry up and are promptly gone with the wind.