Astronauts are Going to Check if There are Microbes on the Outside of the Station

On Thursday January 30th, astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore are doing a 6.5-hour spacewalk outside the International Space Station. Among other goals, they’ll be collecting surface samples from the station to analyze for the presence of microbes. The ISS “surface swab” is part of the ISS External Microorganisms project. It was developed to understand …