There is a Scifi story that I read 10 years ago about a man dying in
his advanced spacesuit.  Eventually the bacteria in the suit begins to
evolve and become self aware after an extended time of drifting in
space.

What was the name of story and who was the author?

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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 03 Mar 2006 10:28 PST

Your description reminds me of James P. Hogan's "Inherit the Stars."

"Scientists endeavor to explain a spacesuit-clad human body that has
lain on the Moon for 40,000 years. The answer requires rewriting the
origins of the human race itself."

http://www.jamesphogan.com/books/inherit/ballantine77/titlepage.shtml

"The stories begin after the earth has solved most of its social and
political problems and has used some of the released resources to
energize its space exploration efforts. They have established moon
bases for the purposes of scientific discovery and experimentation.
The bases are well established when a corpse is discovered in a
previously-unexplored crater. The body is human, though it had large
eyes, plenty of body hair, and fairly long nostrils. The corpse,
nicknamed 'Charlie,' is outfitted with an unusual spacesuit. He died
after sustaining injuries and is over 50,000 years old. The search for
who and what Charlie is, and discovering his origin, may mean a
complete rewrite of man's history."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A1920458

Please let me know if my guess is correct.

"Inherit the Stars" is a novel rather than a short story, and (as I
recall) does not involve evolution by bacteria in the space suit. 
Based on the information provided, dt-tx is probably thinking of a
different story.

I think you might be getting mixed up with more than one story.
There's an Iain M. Banks short story called "Descendant" in his
anthology "The State Of The Art" in which a man dies inside his
(self-aware) spacesuit. I'm not sure where the bacteria comes from, I
suspect it's a different story.

Self-aware bacteria is reminiscent of Wil McCarthy's "Bloom." 
However, that's a novel, not a short story.