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Never-before-seen 'extreme' microbes surrounded NASA robot before it was sent to Mars 18 years ago, new study reveals


DNA analysis has revealed that 26 novel species of "extremophile" bacteria were lurking in a clean room that housed NASA's Phoenix lander before it was launched to Mars in 2007. The hardy microbes might be capable of surviving in space.

Dozens of never-before-seen species of "extremophile" bacteria were hiding in a NASA clean room used to quarantine a Mars lander before it was successfully launched to the Red Planet more than 17 years ago, a new study reveals. You may like Clean rooms are spaces where spacecraft and their payloads are quarantined before launches and upon reentry to Earth, in order to prevent environmental contamination by microbes and keep them free of potentially damaging particles, according to NASA. "Together, we are unraveling the mysteries of microbes that withstand the extreme conditions of space — organisms with the potential to revolutionize the life sciences, bioengineering, and interplanetary exploration," study co-author Kasthuri Venkateswaran, a retired senior research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in the statement.

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