That ‘alien’ bacteria on the Space Station? It’s probably not aliens.

By now you should know that it’s (almost) never aliens.

Still, earlier this week, Russian cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov told the Russian state news agency TASS that he had collected bacteria from outside of the International Space Station (ISS) that was from “outer space” — meaning that it’s of alien origin. 

When contacted, the Russian space agency Roscosmos did not refute Shkaplerov’s claims. Instead, it shared two previous stories from TASS, one of which stated that the exterior of the Space Station might serve as a “temporary custodian of biomaterial of extraterrestrial origin.” By this rationale, perhaps bits of space rock or dust from a comet containing alien microbes could have smacked against the station — and stayed there.   Read more…

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