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Researchers from the United States and India working with NASA have now discovered four strains of bacteria that live in different parts of the ISS, three of which were, until now, completely unknown to science.
Three of the four strains were isolated in 2015 and 2016: one was found in a panel above the ISS research stations, the second was found in the Dome, the third was found on the table surface; the fourth was found in an old HEPA filter brought to Earth in 2011.
All four strains belong to a family of bacteria found in soil and fresh water; They are involved in nitrogen fixation, plant growth, and can help stop plant pathogens. Basically good bacteria to have if you grow things.
You might be wondering what these bacteria do from the ground to the ISS, but astronauts living on the space station have been growing small amounts of food for years, so it’s no wonder we find plant-related microbes on board. .
The team, led by University of Southern California geneticist Swati Bijlani, proposed naming the new species Methylobacterium ajmalii after Ajmal Khan, a renowned Indian biodiversity scientist. This new discovery is also closely related to an already known species called M. indicum.
“To grow plants in extreme locations where resources are minimal, it is essential to isolate new microbes that help promote plant growth under stress,” said two team members, Kasthuri Venkateswaran and Nitin Kumar Singh of NASA JPL, in a statement. press.
Since we already know that these microbes can survive the harsh conditions of the ISS, the team used all four strains to search for genes that could be used to help promote plant growth.
“The complete genomic sequence of these three ISS strains reported here will allow comparative genomic characterization of ISS isolates with similar ones on Earth in future studies,” the team wrote in the published study.
“This will further help identify genetic determinants that could be responsible for promoting plant growth under microgravity conditions and contributing to the development of self-sustaining plant crops for long-term space missions in the future.”
The researchers found that one of the ISS strains, IF7SW-B2T, had promising genes involved in plant growth, including a gene for an essential enzyme for cytokinin, which promotes cell division in roots and shoots.
