Radiation-eating mold could help clean up nuclear sites protect astronauts

Scientists have discovered an unlikely ally in the battle to clean up Chernobyl's radiation zones -- the black mold that thrives in them. EPA

This dark discovery is breaking the mold.

Scientists have discovered an unlikely ally in the battle to clean up Chernobyl’s radiation zones — the black mold that thrives in them.

A research team found that the fungi not only adapted to a radioactive environment, but actually fed off it like something out of a “Marvel” origin story, the BBC reported.

If this is true, the so-called deadly substance — radiation — could be one of the more unlikely building blocks of life.

The groundbreaking research was set in motion in 1997 after Ukrainian microbiologist Nelli Zhdanova embarked on a field expedition in the ruins of the Nuclear Power Plant near Pr