Effects of spaceflight and simulated microgravity on microbial growth and secondary metabolism

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Abstract

Spaceflight and ground-based microgravity analog experiments have suggested that microgravity can affect microbial growth and metabolism. Although the effects of microgravity and its analogs on microorganisms have been studied for more than 50 years, plausible conflicting and diverse results have frequently been reported in different experiments, especially regarding microbial growth and secondary metabolism. Until now, only the responses of a few typical microbes to microgravity have been investigated; systematic studies of the genetic and phenotypic responses of these microorganisms to microgravity in space are still insufficient due to technological and logistical hurdles. The use of different test strains and secondary metabolites in these studies appears to have caused diverse and conflicting results. Moreover, subtle changes in the extracellular microenvironments around microbial cells play a key role in the diverse responses of microbial growth and secondary metabolisms. Therefore, “indirect” effects represent a reasonable pathway to explain the occurrence of these phenomena in microorganisms. This review summarizes current knowledge on the changes in microbial growth and secondary metabolism in response to spaceflight and its analogs and discusses the diverse and conflicting results. In addition, recommendations are given for future studies on the effects of microgravity in space on microbial growth and secondary metabolism.

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Ground-based facilities for simulation of microgravity: organism-specific recommendations for their use, and recommended terminology.

Ruth Hemmersbach, Jens Hauslage, Oliver Ullrich … (2012)

Research in microgravity is indispensable to disclose the impact of gravity on biological processes and organisms. However, research in the near-Earth orbit is severely constrained by the limited number of flight opportunities. Ground-based simulators of microgravity are valuable tools for preparing spaceflight experiments, but they also facilitate stand-alone studies and thus provide additional and cost-efficient platforms for gravitational research. The various microgravity simulators that are frequently used by gravitational biologists are based on different physical principles. This comparative study gives an overview of the most frequently used microgravity simulators and demonstrates their individual capacities and limitations. The range of applicability of the various ground-based microgravity simulators for biological specimens was carefully evaluated by using organisms that have been studied extensively under the conditions of real microgravity in space. In addition, current heterogeneous terminology is discussed critically, and recommendations are given for appropriate selection of adequate simulators and consistent use of nomenclature.

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Microbial responses to microgravity and other low-shear environments.

Michael C. Ott, James Wilson, Rajee Ramamurthy … (2004)

Microbial adaptation to environmental stimuli is essential for survival. While several of these stimuli have been studied in detail, recent studies have demonstrated an important role for a novel environmental parameter in which microgravity and the low fluid shear dynamics associated with microgravity globally regulate microbial gene expression, physiology, and pathogenesis. In addition to analyzing fundamental questions about microbial responses to spaceflight, these studies have demonstrated important applications for microbial responses to a ground-based, low-shear stress environment similar to that encountered during spaceflight. Moreover, the low-shear growth environment sensed by microbes during microgravity of spaceflight and during ground-based microgravity analogue culture is relevant to those encountered during their natural life cycles on Earth. While no mechanism has been clearly defined to explain how the mechanical force of fluid shear transmits intracellular signals to microbial cells at the molecular level, the fact that cross talk exists between microbial signal transduction systems holds intriguing possibilities that future studies might reveal common mechanotransduction themes between these systems and those used to sense and respond to low-shear stress and changes in gravitation forces. The study of microbial mechanotransduction may identify common conserved mechanisms used by cells to perceive changes in mechanical and/or physical forces, and it has the potential to provide valuable insight for understanding mechanosensing mechanisms in higher organisms. This review summarizes recent and future research trends aimed at understanding the dynamic effects of changes in the mechanical forces that occur in microgravity and other low-shear environments on a wide variety of important microbial parameters.

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Optimized suspension culture: the rotating-wall vessel.

Paula T. Hammond, Christopher J. Hammond (2001)

Suspension culture remains a popular modality, which manipulates mechanical culture conditions to maintain the specialized features of cultured cells. The rotating-wall vessel is a suspension culture vessel optimized to produce laminar flow and minimize the mechanical stresses on cell aggregates in culture. This review summarizes the engineering principles, which allow optimal suspension culture conditions to be established, and the boundary conditions, which limit this process. We suggest that to minimize mechanical damage and optimize differentiation of cultured cells, suspension culture should be performed in a solid-body rotation Couette-flow, zero-headspace culture vessel such as the rotating-wall vessel. This provides fluid dynamic operating principles characterized by 1) solid body rotation about a horizontal axis, characterized by colocalization of cells and aggregates of different sedimentation rates, optimally reduced fluid shear and turbulence, and three-dimensional spatial freedom; and 2) oxygenation by diffusion. Optimization of suspension culture is achieved by applying three tradeoffs. First, terminal velocity should be minimized by choosing microcarrier beads and culture media as close in density as possible. Next, rotation in the rotating-wall vessel induces both Coriolis and centrifugal forces, directly dependent on terminal velocity and minimized as terminal velocity is minimized. Last, mass transport of nutrients to a cell in suspension culture depends on both terminal velocity and diffusion of nutrients. In the transduction of mechanical culture conditions into cellular effects, several lines of evidence support a role for multiple molecular mechanisms. These include effects of shear stress, changes in cell cycle and cell death pathways, and upstream regulation of secondary messengers such as protein kinase C. The discipline of suspension culture needs a systematic analysis of the relationship between mechanical culture conditions and biological effects, emphasizing cellular processes important for the industrial production of biological pharmaceuticals and devices.

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Author and article information

Contributors

Ying Huang: huangy@im.ac.cn

Chang-Ting Liu: changtingliu@sohu.com

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Mil Med Res

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Mil Med Res

Title: Military Medical Research

Publisher: BioMed Central (London )

ISSN (Print): 2095-7467

ISSN (Electronic): 2054-9369

Publication date (Electronic): 14 May 2018

Publication date PMC-release: 14 May 2018

Publication date Collection: 2018

Volume: 5

Electronic Location Identifier: 18

Affiliations

[1 ]ISNI 0000 0004 1761 8894, GRID grid.414252.4, Nanlou Respiratory Diseases Department, , Chinese PLA General Hospital/Chinese PLA Postgraduate Medical School, ; Beijing, 100853 China

[2 ]ISNI 0000 0004 0627 1442, GRID grid.458488.d, State Key Laboratory of Microbial Resources, Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, ; Beijing, 100101 China

Article

Publisher ID: 162

DOI: 10.1186/s40779-018-0162-9

PMC ID: 5971428

PubMed ID: 29807538

SO-VID: d5b8f455-d36e-4895-a091-30bbb1e3d76f

License:

Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver ( http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

History

Date received : 23 November 2017

Date accepted : 26 April 2018

Funding

Funded by: National Program on Key Basic Research Project (973)

Award ID: No.2014CB744401

Funded by: General Financial Grant from the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation

Award ID: No.2016M602971

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Keywords: microbial growth,secondary metabolism,spaceflight,microgravity,simulated microgravity,microgravity analogs

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Keywords: microbial growth, secondary metabolism, spaceflight, microgravity, simulated microgravity, microgravity analogs

Effects of spaceflight and simulated microgravity on microbial growth and secondary metabolism

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Cancer Metabolism

Most cited references 95

Ground-based facilities for simulation of microgravity: organism-specific recommendations for their use, and recommended terminology.

Microbial responses to microgravity and other low-shear environments.

Optimized suspension culture: the rotating-wall vessel.

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