Effects on cells entering the VBNC state include "dwarfing, changes in metabolic activity, reduced nutrient transport, respiration rates and macromolecular synthesis".
On March 1, 2018, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) announced their new Biostasis program under the direction of Dr. Tristan McClure-Begley.
The aim of the Biostasis program is to develop new possibilities for extending the golden hour in patients who suffered a traumatic injury by slowing down the human body at the cellular level, addressing the need for additional time in continuously operating biological systems faced with catastrophic, life-threatening events.
"[2] On March 20, 2018, the Biostasis team held a Webinar which, along with a Broad Agency Announcement (BAA), solicited five-year research proposals from outside organizations.
These approaches are based on research into diapause in tardigrades and wood frogs which suggests that selective stabilization of intracellular machinery occurs at the protein level.
[3] Intracellular organelles are either membrane-bound vesicles or membrane-less compartments that compartmentalize the cell and enable spatiotemporal control of biological reactions.
Tardigrades are microscopic animals that are able to enter a state of diapause and survive a remarkable array of environmental stressors, including freezing and desiccation.
[1] Research has shown that intrinsically disordered proteins in these organisms may work to stabilize cell function and protect against these extreme environmental stressors.
[7] By using peptide engineering, it is possible that scientists may be able to introduce intrinsically disordered proteins to the biological systems of larger animal organisms.