A Fungus That Eats Radiation Could Change Space Travel | Alyssa Carson

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:00]And this just popped into my head. I remember this when I talked to Tim Dodd was we found there was this article that talked about this discovery of this fungus. Have you seen it? This Chernobyl fungus >> that was found in Chernobyl where there was a nuclear meltdown. Yeah. Decades ago.

[00:00:17]>> Yeah.

[00:00:17]>> And uh allegedly there's this like fungi that's growing in like ground zero of Chernobyl and they found that it actually eats radiation.

[00:00:29]So, they're hypothesizing that this mysterious black fungus >> could be used in the space capsules or the where they're transporting these people across deep space and it could protect them from the from the radiation.

[00:00:47]Show the uh the first what does the first paragraph of it say?

[00:00:52]>> Mold found at the site of Chernobyl nuclear disaster appears to be feeding off radiation. So they're they're thinking that they could use this to shield the space travels from the cosmic rays. Insane.

[00:01:03]>> Yeah. I mean, honestly, this is a lot of I mean, my uh current research and kind of what I do within astrobiology is certainly like that melting pot between microbiology and and space travel. So, you know, working with organisms in space-like environments. And so honestly, organisms I think are so fascinating and which is why I've kind of gone into into this route of research, but I think it's something that we certainly going to learn more about. I mean, even aside from, you know, using organisms to maybe eat radiation, we're also learning a lot of organisms that are able to survive on the outside of the International Space Station and and survive in the vacuum of space. And >> they are Yeah. So there's been um a lot of this is also kind of more, you know, current and academic research, but they did like an experiment. Um I go to an astrobiology conference and so it's really fun to kind of hear a lot of these like new uh like research studies, but they were having astronauts like swab the outside of their gloves like while they were outside on an EVA and then they're basically growing that to see if anything is coming out. I mean, tardigrates have always been a big area of conversation um which is basically this this organism um that is that they've put on the outside of the International Space Station and it just >> survives back. Mhm. It um it certainly it's able to put up with the radiation.

[00:02:24]It's able to um >> to really evolve and organisms, they adapt so quickly and they're able to adapt obviously much more quickly than humans are. And so I think that that's certainly a big area of interest. Um, and one of that's one of the things that fascinates me so much about the astrobiology field and really bringing in organisms because honestly they're much more adaptable than we are. And so if they're able to, you know, survive in these environments, then you learn so much about those systems and uh and how those work and see, you know, how that can be used for for other things.

[00:02:58]>> Now we have not found any evidence of any kind of mic microorganisms on Mars yet, right? So yeah, we have not. So um my research uh specifically does look at the potential of organisms growing especially in like a past Mars situation. Um because from what we know about current day Mars, uh it's >> not great. Um it does look pretty inhabitable. You know, you have the radiation which is your bigger issue. Um but looking at Mars' past, we think it used to be a lot more similar to Earth.

[00:03:27]So in like the early stages of of Mars and the formation of the solar system, we think, you know, it used to have liquid water. We think it used to be much more habitable. And so by looking at that, we can also test organisms in those environments to see how how they react and if they would be able to survive. So organisms that we know of here that already survive in maybe some unique environments, are they then able to survive in those unique environments like we saw on early day Mars? Well, Elon was saying that there's so much ice on Mars, not even at the poles, like all around Mars, that's just covered in dust. He said if you were to heat up that planet, he believes that you would have mild deep oceans covering about 40% of it.

[00:04:13]And he thinks that about four about four billion years ago, it was a blue planet just like Earth. and that we possibly came from are we I think there's a a large consensus of astrobiologists that believe life started on Mars. Yeah, there certainly is a a theory of, you know, if Mars used to be more similar to Earth, then, you know, was that maybe somewhere that that humans used to survive? But we know we know for sure and I mean, again, Mars is such a wellstied planet at this point, but we we really are learning a lot about, you know, how much water was on Mars and where it came from. And we also think, you know, Mars used to be more in that like habitable zone. So, we think of, you know, Earth being in the habitable zone where you can have liquid water.

[00:04:56]And so we think Mars used to be a little bit more in that habitable zone that's where Earth is, >> right? And then it's kind of slowly shifted outward kind of in the formation of things. And again, >> geological timelines, I mean, this is over the span of, you know, millions and millions of years. But, you know, with uh with the way we used to or think Mars used to look, it just used to have a lot more potential uh especially than what we see from today. So that's why there's always been that that interest in what could be there or what used to be there.

[00:05:24]Um, and yeah, there's still a lot of interest, I think. Um, there's kind of a bit of a balance, I guess, because I'm my research is certainly in the possibility of microorganisms that used to live on Mars or even, you know, if there's any way to to find things and we're still discovering stuff. I mean, we recently just discovered a whole new slew of new minerals that, uh, the Curiosity Rover just discovered. Um, honestly, it was a new paper that just came out. They found some minerals that we hadn't classified yet. Um, and so that was really interesting. um to look at >> on Mars.

[00:05:56]>> Yeah. So they're constantly sampling Mars with the with the rovers. And so with that they are, you know, collecting new samples and some minerals we've seen in like meteorites that have come from Mars. Um and then some we've seen with like other, you know, collections, but this one had a few new ones. And so that's been really interesting. So there's still so much we don't know. So [clears throat] it's so hard because it's it's easy to jump to so many conclusions. And really science as a whole is always jumping to conclusions.

[00:06:24]with some unknowns. But yeah, we're still learning so much about Mars that we didn't even know previously. So, it's going to be interesting and why a lot of interest is in a human mission, right?

[00:06:35]Because we have these rovers. They're discovering a lot of stuff that we didn't know about the planet. But rovers have such long timelines, right? Because of like the time delay between Earth and Mars. So, if you were to send a message to Mars, right?

[00:06:48]>> Yeah. How fast can we send those messages? It's usually about like 15 minutes when Mars is like pretty close to us. Um, it can get like upwards to like longer to like 30-ish minutes, but >> we can't do it at light speed.

[00:06:59]>> No, not quite that fast. Usually there there is usually about a 15ish minute time delay that a lot of the people that work with the rovers also have to deal with. So you have to think of the rovers as such an incredibly slow process because if you're like move forward 2 feet, 15 minutes later it hears it, it does that then you know 15 another 15 minutes later it's like I successfully moved 2 feet. So like in the span of like maybe even minimally 30 minutes you've moved like a couple feet. So, it just is such a slow process and that's really been a big um one of the big benefits about potentially sending humans rather than kind of some of the more robotic technology that we have there is that a human can actually oh that rock looks interesting. Let's collect that. Let's do this. Let's do this experiment. Yeah.

[00:07:42]>> Um >> we would have to get like some some SpaceX uh Starlink satellites going so we can get some super high speeded broadband Wi-Fi, you know, >> better the technology. Yeah, I mean I think that >> I mean even I think even light speeded communication would still be like a few minutes.

[00:07:58]>> Yeah, I think certainly I mean that area is one to improve. I don't think it's like um you know if we can't get that working I don't think it's going to completely you know make it to where the mission isn't possible. I think we've learned to adapt with like the timelines that we currently have, but yeah, it certainly doesn't make it easy and if there's any room to improve there. But kind of the the big I guess back and forth within especially my field is also the idea of planetary protection, right?

[00:08:26]because we want to send humans to really uncover a lot of these things that we want to learn about Mars and maybe the possibility of past life, but then you also, I guess, run into the potential of contamination. And you don't want to potentially find something that we think was past life on Mars, but then it's like >> bring it back here.

[00:08:44]>> Well, not even that, but even just we think we found life on Mars, but just someone touched a rock and it's like our own organisms. And so, it's like very much a an element of like keeping things separate. Um, and even like the ro like all of the robotic technology that we've sent to the planet. I mean, there's assumptions that there's been, you know, you can we can only get things so sterile and we hope that things are as sterilized as possible, but there's also the potential of like, did we send anything on any of these rovers? Um, and so it's just a very much keeping those things separate so that way if you make the grand claim that you found, you know, life on Mars, it's serious and not just something that happened to get sent there. If you enjoy watching our show on Spotify or YouTube and you want to be more involved, I encourage you to please come check out our Patreon community.

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