Infectious Bacteria aboard the International Space Station

In total five Enterobacter bugandensis strains were isolated, detected in a restroom and on the exercise platform. This was part of an exercise aimed at characterizing bacterial communities living on surfaces inside the space station. The study revealed that the ISS Enterobacter has an increased likelihood of pathogenicity to humans.

Enterobacter bugandensis exists as a nosocomial pathogen (hospital) and can cause life-threatening infections in neonates and immunocompromised patients. In particular, has been associated with neonatal sepsis. With Enterobacter In general, the urinary and respiratory tract are the most common areas of infection.

Low temperature electron micrograph of a cluster of E. coli bacteria, magnified 10,000 times.

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According to BioExpert, what was also worrying is that the isolated species potentially pose significant health problems for future missions. This remains a potential because the influence of microgravity on pathogenicity is not known. of these bacteria. In terms of origin, it was not surprising that the genomes of the five ISS Enterobacter The strains were genetically similar to the three strains found on Earth.

However, as reported by the Daily Mail, Dr. Nitin Singh, lead author of the report, said, "Given the results of multidrug resistance [bacteria] and given the increased risks of pathogenicity that we have identified, these species could pose significant health problems for future missions. "

In terms of potential pathogenicity to humans, the PathogenFinder algorithm has shown that there was a 79% higher probability that these organisms would cause the infection if they penetrated into the body. blood. PathogenFinder is a web server for predicting bacterial pathogenicity by analyzing the input proteome (the complete set of proteins that is or may be expressed by an organism at a given time), the genome, or the raw readings provided by the user.

The new discovery, which highlights how humans can contaminate all places they visit, was published in the newspaper BMC Microbiology, under the title "Multiple Drug Resistance Enterobacter bugandensis isolated species of the International Space Station and comparative genomic analyzes with strains of human pathogens. "