Astronauts living in isolated, sanitized space habitats for long periods of time could stay healthier by being exposed to a greater variety of microbes from Earth, according to a new study.
"Sterile environments are not in fact the safest environments," study co-author Rob Knight, a professor at the University of California, San Diego, told Space.com. "Exposure to beneficial microbes in the environment is important for maintaining health — this is not surprising because, as humans, we have coevolved with those environmental microbes for millions of years."
