The name
of the bacterium, found only on the ISS, is Solibacillus kalamii. It is a spore
forming bacteria
Till date, 227
astronauts have flown to the International Space Station which makes it a very
dirty place. However, maintaining hygiene is critical so that humans can live
on it with ease. All the air and water is recycled and being a closed
environment there is a rapid build- up of bacteria. In great news for India,
scientists at NASA have named a new organism discovered by them after the
much-loved APJ Abdul Kalam. Till date, the new organism - a form of a bacteria
- has been found only on the International Space Station (ISS) and has not been
found on Earth! Researchers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), the
foremost lab of NASA for work on inter-planetary travel, discovered the new
bacteria on the filters of the ISS and named it Solibacillus kalamii to honour
the late President, who was a renowned aerospace scientist. Kalam had his early
training at NASA in 1963 before he set up India's first rocket-launching
facility in the fishing village of Thumba in Kerala.
“The name of the bacterium is Solibacillus kalamii, the species name is
after Dr Abdul Kalam and genus name is Solibacillus which is a spore forming
bacteria,” said Dr Kasthuri Venkateswaran, senior research scientist,
Biotechnology and Planetary Protection Group at JPL. The filter on which the new
bug was found remained on board the ISS for 40 months. Called a high-efficiency
particulate arrestance filter or HEPA filter, this part is the routine
housekeeping and cleaning system on board the ISS.
This filter was later analysed at JPL and only this year did
Venkateswaran publish his discovery in the International Journal of Systematic
and Evolutionary Microbiology. According to Venkateswaran, even as it orbits
the Earth some 400 kilometres above, the ISS is home to many types of bacteria
and fungi which co-inhabit the station with the astronauts who live and work on
the station.
Venkateswaran said even though Solibacillus kalamii has never
been found on earth till date, it is really not an extra-terrestrial life form
or ET. “I am reasonably sure it has hitch hiked to the space station on board
some cargo and then survived the hostile conditions of space,” explained
Venkateswaran.
Naming the new microbe after Kalam was natural to
Venkateswaran and his team. “Being a fellow Tamilian, I am aware of the huge
contributions by Dr Kalam,” he said.
New bacteria are usually named after famous scientists.
Venkateswaran is part of a team which is asking that eternal question “Are we
alone in the universe?” Towards that, his responsibilities include monitoring
the bug levels on the ISS and he also has to ensure that all spacecraft that
fly to other planets are free of terrestrial bugs.
One of his big jobs was to ensure that NASA's Mars Curiosity
rover - the massive car-sized almost 1000 kg buggy - was totally sterile when
it left Earth. By international law, this extreme hygiene is required else
other planets could get contaminated by bugs that reach the Martian or other
planets hidden on human satellites. Today, the ISS is the size of a football
field and its construction started with a launch in 1998 and as of now it is
the largest human-made object orbiting the Earth.
Weighing about 419 tonnes, it can house a maximum of six
astronauts.
Source: DNA-22nd May,2017
