LIVING in a super clean environment has been linked with conditions such as asthma, allergies and autoimmune diseases, highlighting the importance of exposure to microbes for good health.
So with astronauts on the overly sterile International Space Station (ISS) susceptible to immune dysfunction, skin rashes and other inflammatory conditions, attention has turned to microbes there - or not there - for the ride.
University of California researchers collaborated with astronauts, who collected over 800 surface swabs on the ISS.
When they compared the ISS samples to different human-built environments on Earth, the researchers found that the ISS microbial communities were less diverse than most samples from Earth, and were lacking in free-living environmental microbes that are usually found in soil and water.
The researchers said that intentionally incorporating these microbes and the substrates they live in, such as soil, into the ISS could improve astronaut health without sacrificing hygiene.
As co-author Rob Knight bluntly explained, "There's a big difference between exposure to healthy soil from gardening versus stewing in our own filth, which is kind of what happens if we're in a strictly enclosed environment with no ongoing input of those healthy sources of microbes from the outside."
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