With air filters and Weekly cleaning and vacuum cleanerNASA does everything possible to keep the international space station clean so that astronauts remain healthy. But astronauts often experience health problems such as immune dysfunction, skin rashes and other inflammatory conditions. A reason can be because ISS could be also Clean, suggest a new study.
Microbes, small and living organisms such as bacteria and viruses, play a Important role in human health. But the samples of surfaces in the IS reflect a surprising lack of microbial diversityRodolfo Salido Benítez, a Bioingenier at the University of California, San Diego, and the colleagues report on February 27 in Cell.
Astronauts swell the surfaces in the kitchen, bathroom, dining room and other areas in ISS. Then they sent the 803 samples to Benítez and colleagues for analysis.
ISS has a lower microbial diversity than most buildings on Earth. And almost all of these microbes come from humans and construction materials, while less than 0.3 percent are from natural environmental sources such as soil and water. As most interior environments on earth, the vast majority of microbes originate in human skin.
Inside and outside the body, microbes compete for resources and space, so maintaining a diverse set makes any of them take over and cause health problems. Low microbial diversity in hospitals, for example, leads to a higher risk of infection. Even microbes at home can affect their health. A study found that Amish communities have a lower risk of asthma That other communities with similar lifestyles because their domestic dust contains microbes of farm animals.
“If we are outside, we are generally exposed to much more microbial diversity for touching animals or land,” says Gibbons, a microbiomas researcher at the Institute of Biology of Systems in Seattle. “When we are inside, these walls, these surfaces act as mirrors. Essentially they are reflecting on our own microbial diversity. “
Maintaining a healthy diversity of microbes in confined spaces will be a growing concern as astronauts spend more time in space and begin the new missions. Scientists will need to try new ways to add more “good germs” to the mixture, such as bringing animals on board or storing the ISS pantry with fermented foods, says Pieter Dorrestin, a chemical biologist of UC San Diego.
“The reality is that we are going to inhabit space at some point, so this work will give us the first idea in terms of the things we need to add and eliminate,” says Dorrestin. “The most important message that we can transmit is how important it is not only to look at what is present, but also what is absent.”
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