Plant Growth in Space

With Space X in the horizon and Elon Musk trying to colonize Mars, science has to resolve the issue of sustained plant production in space. In 2015 International Space Station (ISS) astronauts Scott Kelly, Kjell Lindgen and Kimiya Yui ate a simple salad consisting of only lettuce. Most would ask why this should be so important, well it’s because it’s the first to be eaten and grown in space overcoming the obstacle of growing plants in a micro gravity environment.  If optimal conditions are met; light, temperature, atmosphere, nutrients and water, plants are able to grow similarly as they would on earth. Unfortunately, water does not react it does on Earth, giving Dr. Gioia Massa the task of finding solutions to these barriers. Dr. Gioia Massa, who led a team at Kennedy Space Center, teamed up with Orbital Technology Corporation to design and build the “Veggie” unit. The Veggie unit uses a passive watering system and is possesses plant pillows. The plant pillow are single use units with a soil substrate that will glue the plant seed in place, making sure the plant grows in the proper direction. The apparatus also possesses a LED light bank that emits blue, red and green light needed for proper plant growth. The walls of the entire system can also expand allowing for plant growth. The crew also grew a flowering plant to test for the long-term survival of flowering crops. The tests was a success and required the fully grown lettuce to be sent back for analysis, once deemed editable the astronauts were able the second batch of lettuce. The flowering plants began to die due to over watering, and a fungus began to grow. The astronauts have produced 5 viable batches of edible lettuce, experimenting each time to see what conditions yield the best results and seeing what changing the intensities of light can do. Red light makes leafy crops expand, blue light gives certain vitamins and studies have shown in some cases green light helps with plant density, but this is not universal and must be tested more.  This has not only given more insight on plant growth in space but has also boosted moral among astronauts Next year NASA plans to launch the Advanced Plat Habitat, hoping to grow larger crops. Maybe one day soon growing tomatoes on mars might actually be a real thing.

The experiment has made grown sustainable crops in space a reality. If the next project succeeds, this could lead allow for farming on other planets. The experiment is also important to sees is how humans can benefit while on long missions of space exploration, where a sustainable food source is required.

Diana Vasquez