Keep the shuttle flying: Fwd: Microscopic pathogens found living on ISS

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From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: October 27, 2015 at 10:55:53 AM EDT
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Microscopic pathogens found living on ISS

October 26, 2015
High-Tech Methods Study Bacteria on the International Space Station
The International Space Station, as seen from space shuttle Atlantis in 2011. Image credit: NASA
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Where there are people, there are bacteria, even in space. But what kinds of bacteria are present where astronauts live and work?
Researchers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, in collaboration with colleagues at other institutions, used state-of-the-art molecular analysis to explore the microbial environment on the International Space Station. They then compared these results to the bacteria found in clean rooms, which are controlled and thoroughly cleaned laboratory environments on Earth. They report their findings in the open access journal Microbiome.
Examining samples from an air filter and a vacuum dust bag from the space station, researchers found opportunistic bacterial pathogens that are mostly innocuous on Earth but can lead to infections that result in inflammations or skin irritations. In general, they found that the human skin-associated bacteria Corynebacterium and Propionibacterium (Actinobacteria) but not Staphylococcus were more abundant on the station than in Earth-based clean rooms.
"Studying the microbial community on the space station helps us better understand the bacteria present there, so that we can identify species that could potentially damage equipment or pose harms to astronaut health. It also helps us identify areas that need more rigorous cleaning," said Kasthuri Venkateswaran, who led the research at JPL with collaborators Aleksandra Checinska, the study's first author, and Parag Vaishampayan.
The findings of this study help NASA establish a baseline for monitoring the cleanliness of the space station, which will in turn help manage astronaut health in the future. However, with this particular type of DNA analysis, researchers could not conclude whether these bacteria are harmful to astronaut health.
The space station is a unique environment, featuring microgravity, space radiation, elevated carbon dioxide and constant presence of humans. Understanding the nature of the communities of microbes -- what scientists call "the microbiome" -- in the space station is key to managing astronaut health and maintenance of equipment.
Previous studies of the station have used traditional microbiology techniques, which culture bacteria and fungi in the lab, to assess the composition of the microbial community. Now, Venkateswaran and colleagues are using the latest DNA sequencing technologies to rapidly and precisely identify the microorganisms present on the space station.
"Deep sequencing allows us to get a closer look at the microbial population than with traditional methods," Venkateswaran said.
The team compared samples from the station's air filter and vacuum bag with dust from two JPL clean rooms. While clean rooms circulate fresh air, the space station filters and recirculates existing air. Also, importantly, there are always six people living on the space station, whereas a cleanroom may see 50 people go in and out in a day, but not be inhabited continuously. Clean rooms are not airtight, but there are several layers of rooms that would prevent the free exchange of air particulates.
The researchers analyzed the samples for microorganisms, and then stained their cells with a dye to determine whether they were living or dead. This enabled them to measure the size and diversity of viable bacterial and fungal populations, and determine how closely the conditions in the Earth clean rooms compare with the space station environment.
Their results show that Actinobacteria made up a larger proportion of the microbial community in the space station than in the cleanrooms. The authors conclude that this could be due to the more stringent cleaning regimens possible on Earth. The research did not address the virulence of these pathogens in closed environments or the risk of skin infection to astronauts.
Using these newer DNA sequencing technologies, researchers could also, in the future, study how microgravity affects bacteria. The current thinking is that microgravity is not favorable to bacterial survival generally, but that some species that can withstand it may become more virulent. Such research will be important for long-duration space missions, such as NASA's journey to Mars.
Other study co-authors include Alexander J. Probst of the University of California, Berkeley; James R. White of Resphera Biosciences, Baltimore; Deepika Kumar, Victor G. Stepanov, and George E. Fox of the University of Houston, Texas; Henrik R. Nilsson of the University of Gothenburg, Sweden; Duane L. Pierson of NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston; and Jay Perry of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama.
This research was carried out on a competitive grant awarded by the NASA Space Biology program. The California Institute of Technology manages JPL for NASA.

Media Contact
Elizabeth Landau
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-6425
Elizabeth.Landau@jpl.nasa.gov

Adapted from a Microbiome press release.

2015-330

Microscopic pathogens found living on the International Space Station
Deborah Netburn
Contact Reporter

Astronauts are not the only life forms to inhabit the International Space Station.
The ISS is also home to trillions of microscopic space dwellers that live in the air and on the surfaces of the floating space laboratory. This community of fungus and bacteria make up the space station's unique microbiome.
A new analysis of the bugs living on the ISS found that there are more microbes living in the space station than there are in the carefully controlled cleanrooms at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory here on Earth. The researchers also detected some microbial strains on the ISS that could be harmful to human health.
The results of the new analysis were published in the journal Microbiome.
NASA and other space agencies have been monitoring the collection of microbes that live on the ISS for 15 years, gathering dust from air vents and surfaces, and then growing those samples in labs both in space and on Earth to see what strains of bacteria and fungus could be detected.
However, that technique has some flaws. For example, there are some types of microbes that are more difficult to grow in the lab, and so they may have been underrepresented in previous studies. As NASA looks to long-term manned missions like sending people to Mars, the agency wants to learn as much as possible about the microscopic community that might inadvertently tag along.
The new study relied on DNA sequencing technologies that take into account all the bugs on the ISS, not just those that can grow well in a lab.
The research team looked at two samples. One was taken from an air-filter screen that had been in place for 40 months, and helped scientists determine what organisms were living in the recycled air of the space station. A second sample came from a vacuum cleaner bag whose contents represented the microbes living on the space station's surfaces.
The DNA analysis revealed that the majority of the bacteria found on the ISS is associated with human skin, and very little of it was found in cleanrooms on Earth. The researchers also detected some strains that have a potential to pose a risk to human health, especially for people who have compromised immune systems.
"Astronauts are often in a compromised state in microgravity because their bodies are going through so many changes, " said Kasthuri Venkateswaran, a microbiologist at JPL who led the study. "In an immuno-compromised condition, some of these bacteria could lead to disease."
But just because some of these microbes could lead to disease, it doesn't mean they will. More work needs to be done to see exactly how many of these pathogenic microbes are on board the space station, and if they are virulent, meaning if they are making toxins.
"One or two cells that are virulent may be there, but that might not be enough to cause disease," Venkateswaran said.
The study provides a baseline full spectrum of the microbes on the space station, but there is still more work to be done. The next step is to see whether any of these pathogenic microbes are abundant and if they might pose problems for astronauts in the future.
"We are stepping in the right direction, and NASA is aware that these are the things required for tomorrow's human mission to Mars," he said.

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