The Isolation and Characterization of Rare Mycobiome Associated With Spacecraft Assembly Cleanrooms.

ABSTRACT: Ensuring biological cleanliness while assembling and launching spacecraft is critical for robotic exploration of the solar system. To date, when preventing forward contamination of other celestial bodies, NASA Planetary Protection policies have focused on endospore-forming bacteria while fungi were neglected. In this study, for the first time the mycobiome of two spacecraft assembly facilities at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and Kennedy Space Center (KSC) was assessed using both cultivation and sequencing techniques. To facilitate enumeration of viable fungal populations and downstream molecular analyses, collected samples were first treated with chloramphenicol for 24 h and then with propidium monoazide (PMA). Among cultivable fungi, 28 distinct species were observed, 16 at JPL and 16

SUBMITTER: Blachowicz A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9087587 | biostudies-literature | 2022

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature