A handheld DNA sequencer is about to be sent into space and could one day help detect life

NASA scientists are about to send a handheld DNA sequencer into space — and they have big hopes for what it could find.

A small DNA sequencing device is about to be sent into space. Picture: Andrew Campbell

NEXT week SpaceX will launch fresh cargo to the International Space Station and on board will be a small handheld device that NASA scientists hope will one day help us detect alien life forms.

The little device will be the first virus hunter in space and is set to conduct some cosmic new DNA research.

NASA astronaut Kate Rubins recently arrived on the space station and will be tasked with carrying out the first full-blown DNA decoding, or “sequencing” in orbit.

“We’re really interested in how this works in microgravity. It’s never been done before,” she said in an interview with the Associated Press this week.

Trained as a professional virus-hunter, Rubins travelled to Congo for her research before becoming an astronaut in 2009. She wore top-level biosafety suits for her work with Ebola, smallpox and other deadly viruses on earth, but won’t need such extreme precautions when she fires up the device in space.

On Monday in the US, SpaceX will launch a rocket with the ISS-bound cargo.

The biomolecule sequencer called a minION. Picture: Oxford Nanopore Technologies via NASA

#AstroKate talks about her launch to space and the DNA sequencing @ISS_Research she will conduct. https://t.co/h7kehYDV6g

— Intl. Space Station (@Space_Station) July 13, 2016

At the space station, Rubins will be working with harmless test samples: bacteria, a virus and a mouse genome.

“We’ve got a lot of safety folks on the ground making sure that nothing dangerous gets on board,” said the first-time space flyer. Researchers initially wanted to fly “extreme and bizarre” samples, but decided to stick with well-sequenced, well-understood genomes for easy comparison, said Sarah Wallace, a microbiologist at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

One question ISS astronauts are keen to answer using the pocket-sized device is the exact nature of a weird fungus that is currently growing on the inside of a door on the space station.

“In the past, we’ve had visible fungi growing on the ISS, and we want to know what that fungi is,” Wallace told Gizmodo.

“Is it benign or something to be concerned about? Knowing what it is, the microbiologists can recommend what to do to deal with the issue.”

Researchers also have high hopes for the potential use of the commercially available device once they take it outside the space station.

Scientists believe it will prove useful in identifying life on other planets including Mars. Although further development will be required for that application to become a reality, a major benefit of the device is that astronauts would theoretically be able to detect life in what would practically be real time.

A DNA sequencer reveals the order of chemical building blocks along a strand of DNA. That sequence contains the hereditary information that’s passed from one generation of organisms to the next.

Following this initial $US45,000 experiment, the DNA sequencer will remain on board for possible further use — conceivably even for diagnosing astronaut health in the off-chance of an infectious outbreak.

Oxford Nanopore Technologies, the company behind the experiment, said the device going to space is the same model already used by more than 1000 scientists in 30 countries.