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The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

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Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#11
post #5

"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.

And not that synthohol garbage they make in the replicators!

You need the green stuff.

Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#13
post #4

"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 a…

I'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.

Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#14
There'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-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

Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#15
post #4

"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 a…

I think it's not impossible, it could simply be a matter of the hitchhiking microbes to come into contact with liquid water.

Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#17
I 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.

Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#18

There'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 conta…

An 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-fi...

Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#19

"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.

You're in luck! There's a company that makes beer with yeast that's been in space [0]. [0] https://vostokspacebeer.com/

I 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.

Re: The International Space Station is growing mould, inside and outside

#20
post #4

"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 a…

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