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Can microorganisms survive high-temperature heating during the interplanetary transfer by meteorites?

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Abstract

The question about the tolerance of microorganisms to high-temperature heating at the moments when fragments are launched from the surface rocks of cosmic objects and enter an atmosphere is among the major aspects of the problem of life transfer through cosmic space. The heating process in the course of such events was modeled here, and the survival of microorganisms was revealed by the example of two E.coli K12 mutant strains. Samples of these cultures in desiccated state were exposed to short heating pulses. Heating took place under extremely low pressure. It was experimentally showed that bacteria survive at a temperature up to 250°C with duration ∼10 s under vacuum conditions, meanwhile the same heating under atmospheric pressure leads to complete sterilization.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg, 194021, Russia

    A. K. Pavlov, V. T. Kogan, M. A. Vdovina & A. V. Tret’yakov

  2. Russian Astrobiological Center, St. Petersburg, Russia

    A. K. Pavlov & V. N. Shelegedin

  3. University of Colorado at Boulder, Colorado, USA

    A. A. Pavlov

Authors
  1. A. K. Pavlov
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  2. V. N. Shelegedin
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  3. V. T. Kogan
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  4. A. A. Pavlov
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  5. M. A. Vdovina
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  6. A. V. Tret’yakov
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Additional information

Original Russian Text © A.K. Pavlov, V.N. Shelegedin, V.T. Kogan, A.A. Pavlov, M.A. Vdovina, A.V. Tret’yakov, 2007, published in Biofizika, 2007, Vol. 52, No. 6, pp. 1136–1140.

St. Petersburg State Polytechnical University, St. Petersburg, Russia

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Pavlov, A.K., Shelegedin, V.N., Kogan, V.T. et al. Can microorganisms survive high-temperature heating during the interplanetary transfer by meteorites?. BIOPHYSICS 52, 640–644 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0006350907060176

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1134/S0006350907060176

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