Houston, we have… a microbe? A mysterious bacterial species has shown up aboard China’s Tiangong Space Station, and Dr. Kaylee Byers and Sarah Lando are hopping into the Nice Genes! mothership to investigate. Where did this intriguing new organism come from? Did it evolve in orbit? And what does it mean for the future of space travel?

Click here for tickets and more information about the Nice Genes! Live podcast event on Tuesday December 2nd, 2025.

Resources

1. New Bacteria Have Been Discovered on a Chinese Space Station - WIRED

2. New space-adapted bacteria discovered on China’s space station - CBC

3. Unknown strain of bacteria found on China's Tiangong Space Station - Live Science

4. Niallia tiangongensis sp. nov., isolated from the China Space Station - International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Biology