Studies on bacteria-like particles sampled from the stratosphere |
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| Authors: | M. Wainwright P. K. Weber J. B. Smith I. D. Hutcheon B. Klyce N. C. Wickramasinghe J. V. Narlikar P. Rajaratnam |
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| Affiliation: | (1) Cardiff Centre for Astrobiology, Cardiff University, 2 North Road, Cardiff, CT10 3DY, U.K;(2) Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, S10 2TN, U.K;(3) Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Post Bag 4, Ganeshkhind, Pune, 411 007, India;(4) Antariksh Bhavan, Indian Space Research Organisation, New Bel Road, Bangalore, 560 094, India;(5) Cardiff School of Biological Sciences, Cardiff University, P.O. Box 915, Cardiff, CF10 3TL Wales, U.K |
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| Abstract: | Bacteria-like particles recovered from the stratosphere and deposited on cellulose acetate membranes have been analysed to confirm their bacterial nature. One particle appeared to be attached to an inorganic particle apparently by mucoid material typically produced by bacteria. A filamentous structure, morphologically similar to a fungal hypha, was also observed. EDS analysis showed that the particles were all non-mineral and therefore could be biological in nature. However, the composition of several clumps of nanobacteria-sized particles were found, by SIMS analysis, to be inconsistent with that of bacteria. The results show that it is dangerous to assume that bacteria-like particles seen under scanning electron microscopy are necessarily bacteria. |
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