Engineering Biological Time: Suspended Animation as a Model to Decode Energy–Time Regulation in Living Systems

Suspended animation represents an extreme yet reversible state of life arrest in which movement, development, and metabolic activity become microscopically undetectable. I will present our discovery of a newly inducible form of suspended animation in C. elegans, triggered by high population density in isosmotic liquids and occurring across larval and adult stages. This liquid-induced suspended animation (LISA) is characterized by profound transcriptomic and metabolomic reprogramming, striking lysosomal and mitochondrial remodeling, and coordinated suppression of bioenergetic activity. Genetic analyses reveal that endo-lysosomal regulators promote survival during LISA, while a neuronal axis involving neuropeptide and cAMP/PKA signaling governs awakening. These findings establish LISA as a tractable model to dissect how organisms reversibly modulate biological time through energy regulation. I will discuss how this system provides a conceptual framework linking bioenergetics and temporal control in living systems, with implications for dormancy, hibernation, aging, organ preservation, and ischemic protection.