New bacterial strain may aid space farming!

Researchers from NASA, UoH suggest these strains could make it possible for astronauts to grow their own food in space stations

Hyderabad: Researchers from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and the University of Hyderabad (UoH) have identified novel bacterial strains that may help in space farming.

The recent discovery of new bacterial strains from different locations aboard the International Space Station (ISS) flights may help in creating the ‘fuel’ to help plants withstand such stressful situations, the researchers said on Thursday.

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The bacterial strains belonging to the family Methylobacteriaceae were isolated from different locations aboard the ISS across two consecutive flights. “While one strain was identified as Methylorubrum rhodesianum, the other three were previously undiscovered and belonged to a novel species. Genetic analyses revealed them to be closely related to Methylobacterium indicum. The researchers named the novel species as Methylobacterium ajmalii, in honour of the renowned Indian biodiversity scientist, Dr Ajmal Khan (former Professor at Annamalai University). The genome analysis of Methylobacterium ajmalii strains revealed the presence of genes that are involved in promoting plant growth,” the researchers said.

These strains, researchers suggested, could make it possible for astronauts to grow their own food in space stations (space farming). Commenting on the discovery and based on the genomic data, the lead authors said the strains might possess “biotechnologically useful genetic determinants that may help growing plants in extreme places where resources are minimal”.

However, further experimental validations were being done to prove that it could, indeed, be a potential game-changer for space farming, they said.

The research findings were a collaborative effort of research teams led by Dr Kasthuri Venkateswaran of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, C C Wang of WorldQuant Initiative for Quantitative Prediction, Prof Appa Rao Podile of UoH and Dr Ramprasad (CSIR-pool scientist). The research work was published in a recent issue of the ‘Frontiers of Microbiology’.

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