NASA astronaut Kate Rubins harvested fresh radishes grown in space and opened new doors for producing microgravity food to support future longer-term missions to the Moon and Mars.
The radishes were grown in the Advanced Plant Habitat (APH) on board the International Space Station. NASA has one time-lapse video of the radishes as they grew in the APH over the course of 27 days.
On November 30, Rubins harvested 20 radish plants from the APH, wrapped each one in foil and placed them in cold storage. The radish plants will be sent to Earth early next year on SpaceX Commercial Resupply Services’ 22nd mission, according to a statement from NASA.
Related: Astronauts harvest 3 different crops and try new gardening
Radish is the newest variety fresh products to be successfully grown and harvested in microgravity, and were chosen for the Plant Habitat-02 (PH-02) experiment because the vegetable is well understood by scientists and reaches maturity in just 27 days.
Radishes are also a viable test plant for longer-term future missions because they are edible and nutritious. The vegetable is genetically similar to Arabidopsis, which is a small flowering plant related to cabbage that has often been studied in microgravity, according to the NASA statement.
“Radish is a different kind of crop from leafy greens that astronauts previously grew on the space station, or dwarf wheat, which was the first crop grown in the APH,” said Nicole Dufour, NASA APH program manager at Kennedy Space Center. the explanation. “By growing a range of crops, we can determine which plants thrive in microgravity and provide astronauts with the best variety and nutritional balance for long-term missions.”
The PH-02 experiment allowed NASA scientists to study the ideal balance between care and nutrition in quality breeding plants in space. The radishes were grown with a precise amount of minerals and required little maintenance from the crew. The APH chamber uses red, blue, green and broad spectrum white LED lights to stimulate plant growth, while an advanced control system supplies water to the plants as needed.
The APH is also equipped with more than 180 sensors that allow researchers at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center to monitor plant growth and control the temperature, moisture content and carbon dioxide levels in the room, the statement said.
“Radishes offer great research opportunities due to their sensitive bulb formation,” Karl Hasenstein, principal investigator for PH-02 and a professor at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, said in the statement. Hasenstein has performed plant experiments with NASA since 1995.
In addition to the crop grown in space, so have researchers growing radish since November 17 in the habitat of the control plants in the room of the International Space Station Environmental Simulator (ISSES) at the Kennedy Space Station Processing Facility. The ISSES radish wise harvested on December 14 to be compared to those grown in space.
NASA astronauts will soon plant another round of radish seeds in the APH’s second scientific carrier, allowing scientists to increase the sample size of space-grown radishes to increase the accuracy of the experience, officials said in the NASA statement.
“It is a privilege to lead a team that paves the way for the future of production of space crops for NASA’s exploration efforts, “Dufour said in the statement.” I’ve been working on APH since the beginning, and every new crop we can grow brings me a lot of joy because what we learn from them will help NASA get astronauts to Mars and bring them back safely. “
Follow Samantha Mathewson @ Sam_Ashley13. follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.