Space station’s lack of dirt may damage astronauts’ health, says study | Scientists find sterile ISS environment could explain rashes and cold sores and suggest adding microbes to stations
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/feb/27/international-space-stations-sterile-environment-may-affect-health-of-astronauts-says-study
11 Comments
Convert one of the storage modules into an outhouse. Like a zero-g pit toilet.
Seriously, though. People routinely underestimate how hard it is to remove people from an environment they are adapted to. This is one of the reasons why comparisons between space exploration and the sailing ships of yore don’t hold up.
That’s very interesting. Our knowledge of how our microbiota affects our health is not very developed. I think our gut biome has effects on our mood that is not well understood, for example.
I imagine after 20+ years, the iss isn’t nearly as sterile as it was.
They should send a few teenagers up there that would solve it.
These kinds of insights are why we need to try Biosphere 3.
I think there are just too many ecological questions regarding long term spaceflight to ever say it’s a viable interstellar or even decade long missions through our own solar system.
We are simply sitting on the most complex ecosystem imaginable, any one part of it which fails could cascade through the rest as an extinction event. To say we understand it well enough to be in control of it on Earth is currently ridiculous. The same problem applies to our ability to demonstrate mastery: building an artificial ecosystem that’s self sustainable on a space station.
There’s just so much we don’t understand and insights this “oh hey, the sterilized environment might actually trigger immune responses that harm astronauts” is a big deal.
Just imagine if the next discovery is fatal, even if over years or generations.
Aniara kinds of scenarios.
We need more experiments like this. More attempts and more failures.
I think this is also part of the problem here on Earth, using antibacterial products too much, that you make the surface SO clean, you are also killing the good Beneficial bacteria, causing the bad bacteria to have a free run, where as having good and bad bacteria at the same time sort of keeps each other under control.
Interesting. I would have thought the opposite.
This is why I eat food that falls on the floor
NASA: so we think you might need dirt to battle the cold sores and rashes you are experiencing.
ISS crew: actually it’d be great if you just sent some condoms.
…I mean…with the comments about the station lately, it sure sounds like they are going to add a whole lot of microbes to it before 2030 :/ .
I’ve been saying this for years. People always wanna know how I’m never sick. I don’t religiously wash my hands, I don’t Clorox my counters everyday, I eat the occasional piece of food that falls on the floor, and, on the off chance I do get sick, I just tough it out (obviously unless it’s serious) I don’t ever get meds for minor colds. Being exposed to germs is like going to the gym for your immune system.