This tiny organism contracts 200 times faster than we can blink—here's how

A tiny, aquatic, single-celled organism can contract to one-quarter of its body length in less than 5 milliseconds—hundreds of times faster than a human can blink. Researchers have discovered that the organism, Spirostomum ambiguum, uses a calcium-activated protein network in a fishnet-like configuration to power contraction at much faster speeds than human muscles can. The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, has implications for designing