Gardeners of the Galaxy Mission Report: 24 September 2024
Your weekly round-up of astrobotany news and adventure. This week we've got tapioca as a plant medium, a potato breeding breakthrough, “ecoacoustics” and a bit of extraterrestrial botany.
Hello, Gardeners of the Galaxy! Welcome to this week's Mission Report.
The Faculty of Space Research at Moscow State University is building a new type of greenhouse, designed to provide cosmonauts with fresh vegetables on the International Space Station (ISS), the future Russian Orbital Station (ROSS), lunar bases and long duration space missions. The greenhouse is also an affordable option for use in challenging Earth locations, such as the Arctic.
The unique feature of this greenhouse is its modular nature – individual blocks can be added and removed as needed. The design of the greenhouse is very simple and does not require special repair skills, and all components are Russian made.
Virtually automatic, the greenhouse requires minimal crew time. It can accommodate plants up to 30 cm high (which includes microgreens, peas, dwarf tomatoes and peppers).
Team member Anastasia Aleksandrovna Gross is a leading specialist in the quality department, responsible for developing the scientific program in biology for the ISS/ROSS greenhouse. She says:
“All plants grown in the new greenhouse will be edible. We want to make sure that all plants are diverse, including visually. Diversity is of great importance for maintaining a healthy psychological state of astronauts. We hope that thanks to such ‘grass near the house’ they will feel closer to Earth.”
Interestingly, the team are exploring the use of tapioca (the starch obtained from cassava roots and used in – among other things – bubble tea) as a planting medium. The plants grow in special tapioca plates, and although the experiment isn’t finished yet, the early results are promising.
“Repeating an experiment requires identical conditions, but this almost never happens in space,” says Anastasia Aleksandrovna Gross. “Space weather is very changeable, the trajectory of the space station also runs differently, etc., so it is almost impossible to set up an experiment that would exactly meet all the scientific criteria for repeatability.
Sudden changes in conditions in space are much more significant. For example, flying over the South Atlantic (Brazilian) anomaly, where our magnetic field sags, forming a ‘stocking’, the ISS finds itself in special radiation and magnetic conditions. Such anomalous conditions are not observed on Earth, at least in those areas where people live. Yes, when we grow cucumbers and tomatoes in a greenhouse at our dacha, they are also affected by solar flares and temperature changes, but in space the situation is completely different: it is as if you moved your green greenhouse from your dacha to an area where magnetic ore is mined.”
Read more: Зелень в невесомости: в МГУ строят новую оранжерею для МКС. Интервью с участницей проекта Анастасией Гросс
In other news...
On Wednesday (25 September), ESA and the German Aerospace Agency (DLR) will inaugurate LUNA, Europe’s new ‘Moon on Earth’. Designed to recreate the lunar surface, the facility will be used to prepare astronauts, scientists, engineers and mission experts for living and working on the Moon.
Find out more: N° 50–2024: Media invitation: Inauguration of lunar analogue facility LUNA
Students led by a Southern Illinois University Carbondale researcher may have the rare opportunity to present their research on using microalgae to grow crops in regolith, like the surface of the moon, to scientists and other professionals. The team, one of just 15 nationwide finalists for the U.S. Department of Energy’s AlgaePrize, is working on a project that could be used to grow crops in off-Earth environments such as its moon and Mars.
Read more: Student research team at SIU hopes to discuss research on space-age crops with professionals
In the latest edition of Science Queeries, Dr Cat has an out-of-this-world conversation with Lee Conneely from the ARC Centre of Excellence in Plants for Space. Lee studies how we can insert the genetic instructions for plant-based medicines into other plants so that they can grow the medicines for us. Can we grow tomatoes in space for astronauts to eat the tomatoes and harvest medicine from the leaves? Can we use industrial hemp to produce big yields of different medicines? The idea seems light years ahead or like science fiction, but it is a reality…and a pretty vine idea.
Listen now: Planting some vine ideas.
Space-flown seeds – including tomatoes, okra, eggplant, giant pumpkins, and red peppers – have been successfully cultivated in Yanggao county, Shanxi province, a key region for vegetable production in China.
"The vitamin content of space vegetables is more than twice that of ordinary vegetables, and beneficial trace elements for the human body also increased," said Wang Shouming, a technician at the Hualian Agricultural Technology Demonstration Center.
Read more: Vegetable seeds from space thrive in Shanxi county, boosting yields
A team of Italian researchers is examining exoplanet habitability through the lens of vegetation and albedo. Their research shows that vegetation cover lowers a planet's albedo and warms the climate, nudging the outer limit of the habitable zone.
Read more: How vegetation could impact the climate of exoplanets
Plant astrobiology delves into the adaptations and mechanisms that might allow Earth’s flora to flourish in the harsh conditions of outer space and other celestial bodies. A review published in Biologia Futuradiscusses how plants could adapt to environments characterized by low gravity, high radiation, extreme temperature fluctuations, and different atmospheric compositions, and highlights the essential role of plants in sustaining long-term human presence beyond Earth.
Read more: Exploring The Potential Of Plant Astrobiology: Adapting Flora For Extraterrestrial Habitats: A Review
Earth’s photosynthetic organisms evolved under the Sun’s specific illumination. How would plants do under other stars? n a new study, a trio of researchers simulated the light output from a K-dwarf star and grew two photosynthetic organisms in those conditions to see how they responded. They found that garden cress (Lepidium sativum) exhibited comparable growth and photosynthetic efficiency, and the cyanobacterium Chroococcidiopsis sp. CCMEE 029 exhibited significantly higher photosynthetic efficiency and culture growth.
Read more: Plants Would Still Grow Well Under Alien Skies
BBC Future has a round-up of “some of the most beautiful and terrifying moments from the history of spacewalking.”
Read more: Walking above the air: The awe-inspiring history of spacewalks
A study conducted by Chinese researchers has confirmed that it is possible to continuously produce fibre materials from Martian soil with significant application value in creating fibre-reinforced composite materials for building future Martian bases.
Read more: Scientists demonstrate producing fiber materials from simulated Martian soil
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Outside the Chelsea College of Arts in London, a 10-metre ‘urban greening’ structure has been unveiled: a showcase of using natural materials in construction to support biodiversity. The project, Vert, is designed to address challenges that are common to urban areas, such as rising temperatures, heatwaves and declining biodiversity. Its red oak timber frames, fitted with fabric nets or ‘sails’, can support more than 20 species of climbing plants at once. Its designers say that it encourages nature into the city and creates sheltered spaces to gather.
Read more: London’s new urban greening structure is a ‘garden for insects and people’
Possibly the last plant you would want to take into space, the huge, smelly, otherworldly titan arum has been inspiring awe for centuries. It's only since the 1990s that researchers have begun to look at its odd anatomy more in detail, however. The one at the Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh is nicknamed "New Reekie", in a nod to an old name for the Scottish capital (Auld Reekie), and is 22 years old.
Read more: 'It smells like a food bin that's overflowing': The weird biology of the giant smelly 'corpse plant'
When scientists from Nagoya, Japan used powerful microscopes to study the fertilisation process, they were surprised to find the female part of a flowering plant (ovules) could repel sperm from pollen and direct them to nearby unfertilised ovules in the same plant.
Read more: The fascinating secrets of plant reproduction that scientists are still uncovering
Scientists have always categorised trees into two types based on the sort of wood they make. Softwoods include pines and firs and generally grow faster than hardwoods, like oaks and maples, which can take several decades to mature and make a denser wood.
However, recent research has uncovered something completely new: a third category scientists are calling “midwood”.
Read more: How we discovered a new type of wood - and how it could help fight climate change
First-of-its-kind research shows how "ecoacoustics" can help scientists monitor the health of soils — using underground critter concerts.
Read more: How can you tell if soil is healthy? Just listen to it.
Potato breeding is so slow that people today are still eating many of the same cultivars their great-grandparents did a century ago. Experts say that biotechnology company Solynta has cracked that problem, laying the groundwork for a revolution in potato breeding.
Read more: How Crop Science Is Transforming the Humble Potato
Tom Fernandez, an MSU professor in the Department of Horticulture, has developed management strategies to ensure agricultural inputs such as fertilizers and pesticides aren't washed away from their intended targets, harming the surrounding environment and diminishing water quality.
Read more: Scientists study how to increase water, nutrient-use efficiency in greenhouses, nurseries
The Taeda Tech Project is a £4m collaborative demonstration initiative carried out by the University of Surrey aiming to advance short rotation coppice (SRC) cuttings using aeroponic technology.
Read more: UK: Boosting bio-energy by accelerated willow cuttings through aeroponics
Watch it!
Airbus has been testing two Mars rovers – one with four wheels and one with six – in a quarry in Bedfordshire.
Read more: Quarry doubles as moonscape for space rover trials
A Swedish company is building farms inside supermarkets as an environmentally friendly solution to grow fruits and vegetables.
Read more: Meet SweGreen: This Swedish vertical farm start-up grows vegetables inside of supermarkets
Work it!
A post-doctoral position is immediately available at Purdue University, Indiana, USA, in the department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering in plant bioinformatics and systems biology for studying biological responses in spaceflight conditions. The incumbent will join the NASA Lunar Effects on Agricultural Flora (LEAF) team and will be responsible for developing the science and payload processing plan, for the returned biological samples from the Artemis 3 lunar mission.
Find out more: Artemis 3 Lunar Biology Post Doc
A project-based PhD scholarship is available with Plants for Space, based at La Trobe University. Using simulated Space environments and low Earth orbit, the project aims to understand the role of mechanosensors and cell wall integrity sensors in adapting to Space conditions. Applications close on the 30th September for international applicants and the 31st October for domestic applicants (Australian citizens and permanent residents, or New Zealand citizens).
Find out more: Investigating Plant Cell Wall Pathways in Space Environments (PRO-24066)
Correction:
Last week’s item about the upcoming Plant Habitat-07 experiment referred to “Chad Vanden Bosch, principal investigator at Redwire”. However, the Principal Investigator is actually our friend Gioia Massa at NASA; Chad is a payload engineer on the PH-07 project. Sorry for any confusion!
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Ex solo ad astra,
Emma (Space Gardener)