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Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles

BACKGROUND: With increasing numbers of interplanetary missions, there is a need to establish robust protocols to ensure the protection of extraterrestrial planets being visited from contamination by terrestrial life forms. The current study is the first report comparing the commercial resupply vehic...

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Autores principales: Mhatre, Snehit, Wood, Jason M., Sielaff, Aleksandra Checinska, Mora, Maximilian, Duller, Stefanie, Singh, Nitin Kumar, Karouia, Fathi, Moissl-Eichinger, Christine, Venkateswaran, Kasthuri
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7677455/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33240227
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2020.566412
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author Mhatre, Snehit
Wood, Jason M.
Sielaff, Aleksandra Checinska
Mora, Maximilian
Duller, Stefanie
Singh, Nitin Kumar
Karouia, Fathi
Moissl-Eichinger, Christine
Venkateswaran, Kasthuri
author_facet Mhatre, Snehit
Wood, Jason M.
Sielaff, Aleksandra Checinska
Mora, Maximilian
Duller, Stefanie
Singh, Nitin Kumar
Karouia, Fathi
Moissl-Eichinger, Christine
Venkateswaran, Kasthuri
author_sort Mhatre, Snehit
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: With increasing numbers of interplanetary missions, there is a need to establish robust protocols to ensure the protection of extraterrestrial planets being visited from contamination by terrestrial life forms. The current study is the first report comparing the commercial resupply vehicle (CRV) microbiome with the International Space Station (ISS) microbiome to understand the risks of contamination, thus serving as a model system for future planetary missions. RESULTS: Samples obtained from the internal surfaces and ground support equipment of three CRV missions were subjected to various molecular techniques for microbial diversity analysis. In total, 25 samples were collected with eight defined locations from each CRV mission prior to launch. In general, the internal surfaces of vehicles were clean, with an order of magnitude fewer microbes compared to ground support equipment. The first CRV mission had a larger microbial population than subsequent CRV missions, which were clean as compared to the initial CRV locations sampled. Cultivation assays showed the presence of Actinobacteria, Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, and Bacteroidetes and members of Ascomycota and Basidiomycota. As expected, shotgun metagenome analyses revealed the presence of more microbial taxa compared to cultivation-based assays. The internal locations of the CRV microbiome reportedly showed the presence of microorganisms capable of tolerating ultraviolet radiation (e.g., Bacillus firmus) and clustered separately from the ISS microbiome. CONCLUSIONS: The metagenome sequence comparison of the CRV microbiome with the ISS microbiome revealed significant differences showing that CRV microbiomes were a negligible part of the ISS environmental microbiome. These findings suggest that the maintenance protocols in cleaning CRV surfaces are highly effective in controlling the contaminating microbial population during cargo transfer to the ISS via the CRV route.
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spelling pubmed-76774552020-11-24 Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles Mhatre, Snehit Wood, Jason M. Sielaff, Aleksandra Checinska Mora, Maximilian Duller, Stefanie Singh, Nitin Kumar Karouia, Fathi Moissl-Eichinger, Christine Venkateswaran, Kasthuri Front Microbiol Microbiology BACKGROUND: With increasing numbers of interplanetary missions, there is a need to establish robust protocols to ensure the protection of extraterrestrial planets being visited from contamination by terrestrial life forms. The current study is the first report comparing the commercial resupply vehicle (CRV) microbiome with the International Space Station (ISS) microbiome to understand the risks of contamination, thus serving as a model system for future planetary missions. RESULTS: Samples obtained from the internal surfaces and ground support equipment of three CRV missions were subjected to various molecular techniques for microbial diversity analysis. In total, 25 samples were collected with eight defined locations from each CRV mission prior to launch. In general, the internal surfaces of vehicles were clean, with an order of magnitude fewer microbes compared to ground support equipment. The first CRV mission had a larger microbial population than subsequent CRV missions, which were clean as compared to the initial CRV locations sampled. Cultivation assays showed the presence of Actinobacteria, Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, and Bacteroidetes and members of Ascomycota and Basidiomycota. As expected, shotgun metagenome analyses revealed the presence of more microbial taxa compared to cultivation-based assays. The internal locations of the CRV microbiome reportedly showed the presence of microorganisms capable of tolerating ultraviolet radiation (e.g., Bacillus firmus) and clustered separately from the ISS microbiome. CONCLUSIONS: The metagenome sequence comparison of the CRV microbiome with the ISS microbiome revealed significant differences showing that CRV microbiomes were a negligible part of the ISS environmental microbiome. These findings suggest that the maintenance protocols in cleaning CRV surfaces are highly effective in controlling the contaminating microbial population during cargo transfer to the ISS via the CRV route. Frontiers Media S.A. 2020-11-06 /pmc/articles/PMC7677455/ /pubmed/33240227 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2020.566412 Text en Copyright © 2020 Mhatre, Wood, Sielaff, Mora, Duller, Singh, Karouia, Moissl-Eichinger and Venkateswaran. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Microbiology
Mhatre, Snehit
Wood, Jason M.
Sielaff, Aleksandra Checinska
Mora, Maximilian
Duller, Stefanie
Singh, Nitin Kumar
Karouia, Fathi
Moissl-Eichinger, Christine
Venkateswaran, Kasthuri
Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles
title Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles
title_full Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles
title_fullStr Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles
title_full_unstemmed Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles
title_short Assessing the Risk of Transfer of Microorganisms at the International Space Station Due to Cargo Delivery by Commercial Resupply Vehicles
title_sort assessing the risk of transfer of microorganisms at the international space station due to cargo delivery by commercial resupply vehicles
topic Microbiology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7677455/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33240227
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2020.566412
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