Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
Grow Plants On Moon Or Mars!
Space Farmers Could Grow Crops in Lunar and Martian Soil, Study Suggests https://t.co/1X1T4FTVzD via @SmithsonianMag
— Winchell Chung (@nyrath) October 27, 2019
For this experiment, however, the researchers tested what a second generation crop cycle grown on the Moon or Mars would be like. They used organic material from a previous growing cycle and mixed that with the nutrient poor regoliths. According to the paper, the team used chopped up rye grass to simulate this material. Each Friday of the experiment, they added a nutrient-rich solution created to mimic the addition of human manure and urine that astro-colonists would likely add to their lunar farms.The crops planted in the soils included garden cress, rocket (aka arugula), tomato, radish, rye, quinoa, spinach, chives, peas and leeks. Of those, the only vegetable that failed to grow well in the exo-soils was spinach. The radishes, cress and rye all grew to a point where seeds could be harvested. The team was also able to harvest tomatoes and peas from the lunar and Martian soils. The chives and leeks grew steadily, but slower than normal. While the quinoa produced flowers, it did not produce seeds. Still, the team reports that they suspect this is the first time any plants have been grown large enough to produce fruit in the soil simulants.
Robert Heinlein wrote about plants that could survive on the surface of planets like Mars, for example, the man-sized desert cabbage from his 1949 juvenile novel Red Planet:
The Sun was slipping behind a distant dune; the sunset wind whipped coldly at them. The far edges of the plant lifted and began to curl toward them... The inner leaves were beginning to curl faster than the outer leaves. Such a leaf, four feet wide at its widest and at least ten feet long, raised up in back of Jim and curved in until it touched his shoulder...
In his 1951 story Asteroid of Fear, Golden Age great Raymond Z. Gallun describes a greenhouse on an asteroid:
In their great plastic greenhouse, supported like a colossal bubble by the humid, artificially-warmed air inside it, long troughs were filled with pebbles and hydroponic solution. And therein tomatoes were planted, and lettuce, radishes, corn, onions, melons—just about everything in the vegetable line... Under ideal conditions, the inside of the great bubble was soon a mass of growing things.
See also Martian-Grown Food Might Be Fine. Thanks to Winchell Chung at Project Rho for the tip.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 10/19/2019)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would you like to contribute a story tip? It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add it here.Comment/Join discussion ( 0 )
Related News Stories - (" Space Tech ")
Beautiful Visualization of Dawn Spacecraft
'Then he became aware of a gentle pressure pushing him away from the ship.' - Isaac Asimov, 1939.Tumblin' Tumbleweed Rovers To Eplore Mars
'His sensors out and working, and the whirring of the tape that sucked up sight and sound and shape and smell and form...' - Clifford Simak,Tentacled Robot Captures Space Debris
Preventing annoying space debris build-up.Reflect Orbital Sunlight On Demand
'I don't have to tell you about the seven two-mile-diameter orbital mirrors that circulate around the satellite, making it habitable.'
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
You Will Eat The Cookies Made From Plastic...
'Our planes are going to start bringing in bales of discarded plastics...'
It's A Giant Robot! You Reporters Have Been Warned!
'... completely forgetting the ship at sight of the awesome figure and great head of the giant Gaut...'
Birds Learn To Sing Pictures ala Frank Herbert's Distrans
'We will fight in the time of fighting.'
ElectionSim: China's 'Ender's Game' Battle Sim, Or Lem's 'Kingdom In A Box'?
'So, Ender, we will now begin your education.'
Tactile Skin Supplier Map
'What strange sensitivity! What an amazing development of science was manifested in every move and act and word of this Robot!'
Flock Stymied By 'Adversarial Fashion'
'Forget the head atop it, the legs below, feet, arms, hands. It compels erasure.'
Orb Nomad Zero-Emission Electric Aircraft
'That explains how it was so easy for me to remain motionless in midair or to perch on a flagpole in imitation of a giant bird, even in the windy city of Chicago.'
ICE Buys Shock Gloves Like Batman's
What else is the Caped Crusader using?
Factories In The Sky Will Surpass Those Of Earth
'The thirty-odd miles of The Factory’s circumference...'
Sleeper Drones Lie in Wait
'Wandering mines, you took them out on the edge of the desert, set them down and activated them.'
Warfare Goes Underground In Ukraine
'Once in the very first weeks of the war, before everyone had been evacuated from the surface...'
Robot Bees 3D Printed By Festo
'At first I was struck by the large size of these bees..'
3D Printed Organs From Space
'For a while your colonists will have to come up to the [orbital] Hospital...'
DIY Robot Scorpion Crushes It
'...it raised its front end off the ground and waved its antennae at them, then raised one armoured claw as if to snip them out of the sky.'
How To Settle An Argument Between Two Robots
'Henry... assumed the curious absent look of a robot talking on the TBR circuits.'
The Wind Phone Calls Those Who Have Passed On
'Only I heard that!'
