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The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside
- throwawayfooba 7y agoIs this the first case of extraterrestrial life?
- ncmncm 7y agoNo, that was Laika.
- Ice_cream_suit 7y agoThat sadly was a case of extraterrestrial death. "In 1999, several Russian sources reported that Laika had died when the cabin overheated on the fourth orbit. In October 2002, Dimitri Malashenkov, one of the scientists behind the Sputnik 2 mission, revealed that Laika had died by the fourth circuit of flight from overheating."
- mkl 7y agoThere were probably microorganisms and fungi on Sputnik, and before that, things that didn't orbit, like a V2 rocket in 1944: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MW_18014 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MW_18014
- bufferoverflow 7y agoAnd long before that, all kinds of organisms lifted up by natural explosion - asteroids, comets, volcanoes.
- ncmncm 7y agoLaika was the first organism that we knew was alive in space. For a time. At the time, and for decades after, everyone assumed anything on the outside would dessicate and die immediately.
- goddtriffin 7y ago"But the spores may not be all bad though. Cortesao's research is looking for ways the space-growing fungi may help us long-term, investigating their capacity to grow in less than ideal conditions. The study's aim is to harness the hardy microbes as biological factories to create materials astronauts may use on longer missions, such as antibiotics and vitamins." I wouldn't mind tasting some space-alcohol.
- thrax 7y agoAnd not that synthohol garbage they make in the replicators!
- krapp 7y agoYou need the green stuff.
- Ice_cream_suit 7y agoSoylent Green is people.
- tomxor 7y agoNo it's Romulan Ale silly.
- GaryNumanVevo 7y agoYou're in luck! There's a company that makes beer with yeast that's been in space [0]. [0] https://vostokspacebeer.com/ https://vostokspacebeer.com/
- Stratoscope 7y agoI don't see anything on their site that indicates the use of yeast that has been in space. If that were the case they would surely mention it. It looks like it's just beer in a special bottle that they say will work in zero-G.
- wwwtyro 7y ago"The research touches on this, and it warns astronauts to follow recommended planetary protection protocols designed to prevent visiting spacecraft from contaminating other planets and moons in our solar system with microorganisms from Earth. The study suggests that, because of the risk of contamination, these fungal spores may need to be considered a more serious threat." This makes me wonder if we've accidentally already started terraforming Mars.
- NikolaeVarius 7y agoThings already go through decontamination.
- tomxor 7y agobut decontamination is always relative, otherwise you will destroy the thing you are "decontaminating".
- nck4222 7y agoThings already survive decontamination.
- jodrellblank 7y agoPrions on Mars.
- delecti 7y agoI'm more excited by the prospect that we've started terraforming Venus. It has an atmosphere, and with a lot of CO2. Wouldn't take many surviving plant microbes on one of the probes we've sent to start things off. Get the CO2 under control and in a few million years it might be downright balmy.
- Retric 7y agoEdit: ops grand parent mentioned Mars and it’s atmosphere is extremely thin. For comparison at 35,000 feet on earth it’s 3.4 psi. On mars at ground level it’s 0.088 psi. Add in being 53% further from the sun and would take quite a bit to make Mars habitable. Venus has the opposite problem sitting much closer to the sun and with much higher atmospheric pressure.
- nickserv 7y agoAnd I thought I had it bad in my kitchen. In any case I'm really wondering how it grows outside, which the article didn't really explain. It's one thing for the spores to survive in vacuum, another altogether for it to actually grow in vacuum. Or did I misunderstand something?
- mirimir 7y agoMaybe just sloppy title writing. Because TFA says nothing about it growing outside.
- igravious 7y ago“New research being presented at the Astrobiology Science Conference shows the International Space Station has an irritating mould problem — not only on the inside, but the outside, too.” "We now know that [fungal spores] resist radiation much more than we thought they would, to the point where we need to take them into consideration when we are cleaning spacecraft, inside and outside," Cortesao said in a statement. emphasis mine
- FatDrunknStupid 7y agoThis. Anyone explain?
- jchrisa 7y agoI wonder what the minimum viable terrarium is? The idea that we could keep something sterile will seem barbaric to our descendants.
- orbital-decay 7y agoThere's also another similar long-term experiment being performed on the International Space Station [0]. It's not finished yet but apparently preliminary results [1] suggest that microorganisms can possibly be lifted into the upper atmosphere from the oceans somehow. They found different planktonic species from all over the world on the outer surface of the space station, which is hard to explain by spacecraft contamination on the ground or during the flight alone. [0] http://tsniimash.ru/science/scientific-experiments-onboard-the-is-rs/cnts/experiments/test/ http://tsniimash.ru/science/scientific-experiments-onboard-t... (in Russian, but Google Translate seems to work okay on this one) [1] https://www.energia.ru/ktt/archive/2015/01-2015/01-03.pdf https://www.energia.ru/ktt/archive/2015/01-2015/01-03.pdf
- bb88 7y agoAn armchair explanation might be that a hurricane or tornado might be able to do this. Water spouts have scooped up fish into the sky only to dump them on land hundreds of miles from shore. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1254812/Hundreds-fish-fall-sky-remote-Australian-town-Lajamanu.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1254812/Hundreds-fi...
- tonyarkles 7y agoIn Ben Rich's book about the Skunkworks, one of the aircraft (U2? SR71?) was encountering high-altitude insect impacts on their windshields. Turns out they'd been lofted up there by nuclear tests.
- snarfy 7y agoI recall reading mold has a redundant set of DNA. For a mutation to happen, both sets need to have the same damage/radiation/etc happen at the same time. It's believed to be the reason why molds evolve so slowly and why they are so resilient to radiation damage.
- ChuckMcM 7y agoWell that is an interesting result. Also bodes well for the pan spermia crowd, they are the ones that think an asteroid impact can bring life to a planet and kick off the whole life cycle. Certainly the center of an icy mass probably stays well within the survival parameters of these forms of mold. Also interesting to see if we can deduce the DNA changes that lead to this resistance. It would be an advantage for astronauts to be highly resistant to x-rays and other DNA damaging events. Of course I always think of "The Andromeda Strain" when I read things like this. At least this mold doesn't seem to "eat" radiation for energy. Random observation: I guess the Canadians spell mold as 'mould' ?
- csours 7y agohttps://english.stackexchange.com/questions/87978/how-and-when-did-american-spelling-supersede-british-spelling-in-the-us https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/87978/how-and-wh... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplified_Spelling_Board https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simplified_Spelling_Board
- chenster 7y agoMaybe (and likely) there already exist intelligent alien life forms capable of living in the radiation and vacuum of outer space and migrates from planet to planet, even feed on radiation like Gozila does.
- mongol 7y agoIs the Andromeda Strain good? I have heard about it.
- joubert 7y agoThere’s a fantastic show on Netflix called “One Strange Rock” that talks about how earth sustains life, interconnected systems, and astronauts’ views on being earthlings.
- jbverschoor 7y agoLife in space!
- zenpaul 7y agoBeing a homeowner, hearing an "irritating mould problem" didn't make me think "resilient fungi could lead to new kinds of materials for use in space". It made me think that there are some serious health risks for those astronauts if that mould gets out of control. Funny nobody mentions that.
- CriticalCathed 7y agoMold problems are significantly overblown in homes. Even a moderate amount of mold isn't really a significant health risk. It can be a serious problem for people who are allergic, or have compromised immune systems. Even the ever feared "black mold" isn't particularly dangerous. When a home has a mold problem, the solution often isn't even to clean up the mold. The solution is to figure out why the mold is growing, which is usually humidity problems or leaky pipes or poor ventilation, and deal with that. Once you've got the moisture problem handled the mold issue pretty much goes away. (don't astronauts have suppressed immune systems or something btw?)
- sorenn111 7y agoI think from the Twin Study they saw changes in the immune system, but not severely compromised. Additionally, NASA astronauts are a highly selective population in pretty strong physical conditions who are lightyears away from those you hear about who have truly suppressed immune systems.
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- sova 7y agoThe risk of contaminating other planets with life? lol
- sova 7y agoall you who voted me down, none of you read the article i'm guessing
- chiefgeek 7y agoSounds like potential proof of Terrence McKenna's argument in "Food of the Gods" that mushroom spores were interstellar!
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]