"So he mustered the courage to creep into the sleeping bears' dens and stick thermometers in their rectums, a gambit that allowed him to assess just how much their internal temperature declined during their annual torpor."<p>That sentence right there is worth the read...
An interesting read..<p>On another note, I'm sure my other half is a bear, or at least a genetic anomaly. She can somehow sleep 16 hours a day for days on end.
As someone that spends almost no time thinking about hibernation, this was a pretty interesting read! On the problem of weight needed to sustain a crew to and from Mars, could we not setup something like a network of stations for the sole purpose of resupplying ships on long journeys? A moon base seems like it would be a good start as well.
i'm re-reading Three Body Problem, (well, Deaths End, book three of the the trilogy, Remembrance of Earth's Past) and hibernation plays a major role in story. if given a chance and no more personal attachments to my current time, i would seriously consider hibernation for a pretty long period.
I hope we see some hibernation breakthroughs in the coming years, but I think that (unfortunately) our species is going to remain “grounded” if we don’t develop Faster Than Light (FTL) travel capabilities.