Mushrooms in Space
EmailWhen the first Star Wars film appeared in 1977, it was a revelation: things in space could be…grimy, or smelly, or worn-out. Remember the trash compactor scene? This was no news to actual astronauts of the time, who gamely spent weeks in orbit without showers or toilets. They played it down. Last night it got played up a bit. Gina Sunseri, who reports from Houston for us, passed on this tidbit from the Space Station, currently docked with the shuttle Endeavour: "Cosmonaut Yury Lonchakov called down to the Russian control room from the International Space Station to report something unexpected in a corner of the space station: mushrooms. "They aren’t an experiment. Somehow mushrooms are growing where they shouldn’t be growing in a dank dark corner of the space station." "So in addition to the toilet, the kitchen, the bedrooms, the fridge, they have a produce garden as well." We first posted this on the World Newser last night. Since then, Clarissa Ward, our Moscow correspondent, has added a note from there: "According to Aleksandr Sprin with the Russian mission control: "’If there’s not enough ventilation in the bathroom then, because it’s damp, the bacteria grows into a fungus. The cosmonauts were apparently hanging their wet towels in the bathroom and then they noticed that on the back wall there were fungi (or mushrooms) growing. The fungi are now being removed with some chemical cleaner.’ "Ewww!!"
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Fungi DO NOT grow from bacteria – on maybe not from. They are probably growing on plastics and other chemicals there.
These people better learn biology before they report on it.
Posted by: botrytis | November 21, 2008, 11:59 am 11:59 am
botrytris, the Russian may not have a strong command of the English language and he described it incorrectly. Or maybe his words were mistranslated by someone.
Posted by: Jason | November 21, 2008, 12:14 pm 12:14 pm
There’s a fungus among us!
Posted by: Tim | November 21, 2008, 12:19 pm 12:19 pm
I beg to differ with the comparison to Star Wars images. Yes, of course, there was the trash compactor scene in the “New Hope” episode, but generally the ships were spotlessly clean… TOO clean.
It wasn’t until the first “Alien” that we saw the Nostromo depicted as a working space ship, grimy and dirty, providing a realistic look at what MOST spaceships would actually be. In the “Firefly” series, we saw the Serenity as a realistically believable ship, barely in working order.
Star Wars was indeed a milestone in sci-fi, but it wasn’t until a year or two later that spaceships began to look “normal”.
Posted by: Rhys | November 21, 2008, 12:21 pm 12:21 pm
The fungi, like mildew or mold in your bathroom, feed on the biofilm on the surfaces…you know a combination of our skin cells, any organic micro particulate matter floating around, and bacteria as well…but of course bacteria does “grow into” fungus but here are some actinobacteria than appear like a fungus…
Maybe it was lost intranslation somewhere…
Posted by: flscrub | November 21, 2008, 12:25 pm 12:25 pm
Mushrooms in space?Mescaline, the sixties…Not everybody at NASA is a nerd!
Posted by: Luis Rodriguez | November 21, 2008, 1:17 pm 1:17 pm
Spores, do they come from bacteria?
Posted by: cc | November 21, 2008, 1:22 pm 1:22 pm
Yeah.
The spiders now this.
The beginning plot device of another bad scifi movie.
They just keep giving the scifi channel more bad ideas.
Posted by: Jason | November 21, 2008, 2:32 pm 2:32 pm
Well, at least it isn’t Stachybotrys – yet.
Posted by: Jordan | November 21, 2008, 2:49 pm 2:49 pm
Sounds like Cowboy Bebop Episode #17: Mushroom Samba
Posted by: Example | November 21, 2008, 3:00 pm 3:00 pm
Maybe before we are visited by live aliens, we will intercept a ghost ship. Imagine an intergalactic mission that came up just short due to infection.
Posted by: Kev | November 21, 2008, 3:01 pm 3:01 pm
A tragical incident, a ghost ship wrecking earth 10k years later :-)
Posted by: datadirt | November 21, 2008, 3:15 pm 3:15 pm
That cosmonut sounds like she needs a fungi
Posted by: North Park | November 21, 2008, 3:27 pm 3:27 pm
pigs in space – how about hanging up those wet towels boys?
Posted by: e-wench | November 21, 2008, 3:28 pm 3:28 pm
The first organism’s on earth ? I can’t believe the ignorance. We all, every living thing comes from bacteria,mold ,fungus etc. So we are all mushrooms. Aside from spiders who by the way don’t quite make it to outer space. Spores so far are the only thing found in exposed outer space to still be alive. So if we come from a fish or a monkey, where did they come from ?Inhale one breath in the Fall and that is enough spore to cover an acre with mushrooms.So in the fall don’t breath cause the srooms are doin it.
Posted by: Scott | November 21, 2008, 3:40 pm 3:40 pm
What a complete waste of tax payer monies: Nasa programs.
Posted by: RalphF | November 21, 2008, 4:38 pm 4:38 pm
I’ve seen enough sci-fi movies to know thats not good news! LOL Killer Mushrooms from Space…
Posted by: Lorraine | November 21, 2008, 4:48 pm 4:48 pm
Why a chemical cleaner? Why not add some spinach, and little salad dressing and … Voila! The CO2 footprint of transporting food to space incrementally declines by __________________(fill in the blank).
Posted by: Wisdom | November 21, 2008, 5:24 pm 5:24 pm
…..what if they were Oaxacan Magic Shrooms?. Plus the fact of being in outer space. Nature imitating science.
Posted by: pLANETaX | November 21, 2008, 6:31 pm 6:31 pm
Millions of tax payers dollars to learn that mushrooms can grow in space. Thank you NASA! This is a big improvement since Tang.
Posted by: Andrew | November 21, 2008, 6:36 pm 6:36 pm
Don’t kill em with cleaners Dude!! Eat em! Shroomin’ in zero gravity would be COOL!
Posted by: 'Shroomin' | November 21, 2008, 6:41 pm 6:41 pm
You people think Nasa wastes money?? Look at our govt giving free bailouts to greedy corporations! And Obama is already promising even more hand outs to the big three once he takes over America! I bet Obama will waste more money in a day than Nasa does in a year!
Posted by: Nobama | November 21, 2008, 6:47 pm 6:47 pm
Oaxacan Magic Shrooms? lol the thought of in space would be wild enough, let alone tripping while floating around omg.
Posted by: FreshMeatz | November 21, 2008, 7:02 pm 7:02 pm
Launch Little Astronaut Muffet
Use the mushroom as a Tuffet.
Muffet could sit on it a every day.
And each web-weaving spider
coukd spin lassos right beside her
to grab the $100,000 tool pack
floating away.
Posted by: Wisdom | November 21, 2008, 8:00 pm 8:00 pm
Pics or it didnt happen
Posted by: Geordie | November 22, 2008, 4:40 am 4:40 am
In Russian there Mushroom and fungus are the same word.
Posted by: dave | November 22, 2008, 4:54 am 4:54 am
How do you hang a towel in zero g?
Posted by: sempai's pleasurous nutrients | November 22, 2008, 4:58 am 4:58 am
Did anyone think to identify what kind of mushroom it is? For all the cost of sending a scientific expedition into space, it would be nice to have that data.
Posted by: ripple | November 22, 2008, 5:54 am 5:54 am
Terence Mckenna used to speculate that the mushroom was an alien life form and that spores were well suited for space travel.
Posted by: BA | November 22, 2008, 8:56 am 8:56 am
its the flood!!!!
Posted by: david | November 22, 2008, 9:22 am 9:22 am
If space is infinite, by definition there is mush-room in space…
Posted by: Worz13 | November 22, 2008, 10:39 am 10:39 am
Bacteria and fungi are in completely different domains. One can’t grow into the other.
Posted by: Fishhead | November 22, 2008, 2:17 pm 2:17 pm
Too bad a picture of the space mushrooms
was not shot. That would have been
the first photo of naturally growing
space mushrooms.
thanks from tony
Posted by: ntopics | November 22, 2008, 2:21 pm 2:21 pm
It would be nice if NASA had more innovative stuff to talk about… Public opinion on their projects suffers when they report on basically minor items like mold growing in a dank corner or spiders building webs. It’s like we’re reading about someones inane twitter messages rather than real news half the time. Send a couple “ordinary people” up there with a camera and let them document the silly stuff and the drama of living in a space station… Some network would probably fund it… That kind of news coming from an expensive scientific organization just makes it look silly and unprofessional.
Posted by: privatemale | November 22, 2008, 3:56 pm 3:56 pm
This really isn’t anything new, there was bad mold problem on MIR.
It grew behind controls panels and just about anywhere light and fresh air didn’t reach.
Posted by: XDisk | November 22, 2008, 4:20 pm 4:20 pm
its not fungus, their actually space aliens observing the crew of the space station, plotting to take control of the world.
Posted by: mindless | November 22, 2008, 4:22 pm 4:22 pm
Funny there was never any photographic proof. There’s 24 coverage on the Nasa channel, and yet no photos of the mushrooms? I say it’s all BS! Just like the lunar landings.
Posted by: Dr. Doom | November 23, 2008, 3:19 pm 3:19 pm
Trust the fungus
Posted by: ShatBrickner | November 24, 2008, 11:24 am 11:24 am
How exactly do you “hang” a wet bathroom towel in zero g?
Posted by: Colin | November 24, 2008, 1:08 pm 1:08 pm
“hanging” a towel in space must be interesting. Wonder how this is accomplished..
Posted by: Moribund | November 18, 2010, 4:32 pm 4:32 pm
Could the ISS grow actual mushrooms? I was reading up on mushrooms, and this sounds like an easier way to grow food than having a greenhouse. Apparently, fungi can live on a lot of wastes. If you can get a productive composting tray and warm temperatures, these things can recycle air and make food? I’d imagine you’d want something the size of a rail road boxcar for an adequate food supply?
Posted by: tom | May 30, 2011, 10:01 am 10:01 am