Dutch Researchers Grow Crops In Simulated Lunar and Martian Soil (blastingnews.com) 120
MarkWhittington writes: When people start living on the moon and Mars on a permanent basis, they are going to need to grow their own crops to produce food to eat. Indeed, in the recent hit movie, "The Martian," Matt Damon's character grew potatoes to survive long enough to be rescued. With that in mind, researchers at Wageningen University in the Netherlands have been trying to grow crops in simulated lunar and Martian soil. The first attempt was not successful. The second, however, proved to have promising results.
Missing ingredients (Score:1)
They forgot to add a bunch of crap!!!
Re:Missing ingredients (Score:4, Informative)
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Score 5: Informative? (Score:1)
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Grass (Score:5, Funny)
This time, however, fresh-cut grass was added to the growing medium.
Yes, we Dutch people have lot's of experience in adding grass into the mix...
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Not to mention your years of experience as growers.
Seriously, who else would be experts in growing shit under artificial light?
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Seriously, who else would be experts in growing shit under artificial light?
I'd look in WA or AK
Or, you know, CA
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Where will the fresh cut grass come from? (Score:3)
Ok, it's just an experiment using simulated soils, but if it were tried for real then getting fresh cut grass to either the Moon or Mars might prove problematical.
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They'll be flying to Mars for 8 months or so. If they just dehydrate their faeces (gotta drink, you know) and keep the dried residue, they'll have plenty of fertilizer once they get there.
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Which KSP mod do I have to download for that?
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I imagine a voyage to Mars would require a modular spacecraft assembled after multiple unmanned launches from Earth. The manned component could have the required living organics necessary to start farming.
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I'm not saying it's anything that will happen soon.
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If we expect to set up colonies on Mars that allow the growing of food crops, I think it's a reasonable expectation that our space travel technology would also improve.
What if we begin with the expectation that we wouldn't go unless there was a reason to do so?
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Projects that require billions of dollars and are generally unpopular need more reasons than that.
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That's easy - just grow it on the Moon or Mars? Oh, wait...
The other minor problem for those who bothered to read TFA... the soils (and thus the plants) are rich in toxic heavy minerals so no one dared to eat them. This problem will be "discussed".
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Those were the soils they took from the active volcano on Earth. The equivalent Mars soil would have the same lack of microbes and nutrients but should also lack the toxins.
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but should also lack the toxins.
Or have even more...minor detail. Look it up. On Earth we have rain which along with time and sunlight tends to get into really tiny places and break things up and leach heavier elements deeper into the soil or downstream to the sea...
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"concerns" doesn't mean that the toxins were taken up, just that there were "concerns". That's a bit odd, because such analyses are pretty trivial, and absolutely routine. Odd that.
My guess would be that they didn't analyse the "soils" either, and just took the composition, including the toxin content from the wrapper. [Googles] And here's the MSDS : http://www.orbitec [orbitec.com]
Re:Where will the fresh cut grass come from? (Score:5, Interesting)
Not really, unless you want to start a full-scale farm on day 1. You could easily bring a bit of potting soil and some seeds for fast-growing grass to get started, preferably something that can spread through the roots instead of only by seed. Trim the grass regularly to maintain maximum growth rate, and use it to enrich additional soil for the grass to spread into. It may take a while to enrich enough soil to start farming, but you're dealing with exponential growth so it will happen a lot faster than you might expect. Plan it right, and by the time you have your first pressurized greenhouse constructed you'll be ready to seed a substantial fraction of it with grass right away, and by the time you have your second greenhouse constructed you should have plenty of grass to enrich the soil immediately.
Choose your grass wisely, and it will be an effective oxygen producer while it's busy enriching your soil. Take the right grass and/or companion microbes to break down cellulose into something we can digest and you can even eat the grass while waiting for your more nutritious crops to grow. I wonder how difficult it would be to make an artificial "cow stomach" bioreactor? After all cows don't actually digest grass, they digest the microbes that digest the chewed grass.
And of course you don't actually need soil at all - you could start out growing grass hydroponically. Hydroponics has much higher infrastructure requirements that make it unattractive for large-scale usage in resource constrained environments, but a small scale facility could be a viable epicenter for staring "keystone" plant populations.
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Yep, hydroponics are wonderful, so long as the infrastructure requirements are acceptable. Highly profitable cash crops within a fully industrialized economy are an easy win. Growing staple crops 140 million miles from the nearest hardware store... that gets a little dicier.
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Not on Mars you can't [space.com]. Martian soil is highly toxic and will have to be processed and separated before use as farmland.
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Perchlorates are indeed an issue, fortunately they're mostly water soluble which should make low-tech sand washing procedures quite viable so long as the colony is established near a plentiful water supply (which is probable anyway), or there's a similarly effective way to remove the perchlorates from the water for re-use. Evaporation maybe, it sounds like perchlorates tend to be salts, and I'm sure a concentrated supply of powerfully oxidizing salts would be useful stuff.
And once you get the concentration
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Probably your first crop would end up being a sacrificial crop as you generate soil and try
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Fault tolerance. If your pump breaks down, your x-roponic crop is immediately living on borrowed time.
Low infrastructure demands: pressure domes are still necessary, but with soil you pretty much just need a guy with a bucket occasioanally adding water as fast as it's incorporated into the crops. That helps scalability as well - pressure domes can be made with relatively low tech, lighting as well. high-reliability water pumps, etc. are a lot more finicky.
Basically, when homesteading 150 million miles fro
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Root vegetables don't like being underwater.
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You can grow grass by adding fresh cut tomatoes to the soil.
Spoiler (Score:4, Insightful)
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No worries, the potatoes are less than half way through the movie, nowhere near the end. Much more happens.
Besides, watching any trailer reveals the potato growing.
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Emo kid: Whatever. Everyone dies eventually anyway...
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Him being stranded until he dies would probably not be a Hollywood script but an independent movie.
It's called a Hamlet ending (i.e., everyone dies). All it takes is one good independent movie to make money at the box office, and Hollywood will rush into production with a bunch of Hamlet-ending movies.
Re:Spoiler (Score:4, Funny)
Really, you work in production?
Nope. I've seen a lot of movies over the years. I make too much money as an I.T. tech in Silicon Valley to wait on tables in Hollywood.
Or just talk out your ass on a regular basis?
This is Slashdot. You must be new around here.
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Or just talk out your ass on a regular basis?
This is Slashdot. You must be new around here.
There needs to be a "+1, good use of /. trope" mod.
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Darn, now you spoiled the trailer for me!
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Thank you for ruining the end of the movie for me!
It's been five months. The Spoiler Expiration Date has passed.
Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Huh? What kind of lousy "simulants" are those? Is Hawaiian volcano soil rich in perchlorates? Martian regolith is oxidizing enough that if you were playing around in it with your bare skin you'd get burns [nasa.gov]; it's similar to handling undiluted lye or bleach, highly destructive to organic matter.
It's also very corrosive just from abrasion, although lunar regolith is worse. Trivia for people here: how many vacuum-sealed samples of lunar regolith do you think we have left over from the Apollo days? Answer: none. The regolith abraded the seals over time, creating pinpoint leaks; every last sample is now partially oxidized by Earth air.
Additionally, both are believed to be very hazardous in terms of silicosis risk, akin to breathing what comes off of a rock crusher (Mars's is finer, but both are in the hazardous range). Martian regolith has some other nasty chemical surprises though (beyond the perchlorates)... among the contaminants that have been identified is what appears to be significant amounts of hexavalent chromium. That's the type of chromium almost never found in nature on Earth (because we live in an oxidizing environment) that's extremely toxic to people (think Erin Brockovich).
This isn't just Earth soil; it's a totally different beast.
Anyway, I'm not that big of a Mars fan... I'll take a colony on Venus any day over one on Mars. ;)
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And beyond that, you don't need soil to grow plants. Hydroponics / aeroponics are pretty much perfectly suited for Mars agriculture - minimizing the water and nutrient loads needed.
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The problem with hydroponics is that all nutrients have to be added to the water. Plants do not grow well in distilled water.
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Trivia for people here: how many vacuum-sealed samples of lunar regolith do you think we have left over from the Apollo days? Answer: none. The regolith abraded the seals over time, creating pinpoint leaks; every last sample is now partially oxidized by Earth air.
Why couldn't they just put it in vacuum-sealed glass jars, and not turned them upside-down? The regolith isn't going to abrade the glass away, especially if you leave the jars sitting on a shelf (and you can use a harder, higher grade of glass too
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If oxidation was the concern (which is what the original claim implied), there was never any need to keep them in vacuum. Dry nitrogen or argon would have done the job perfectly well and been a lot less hazardous than rigid vacuum vessels on the returning (atmosphere-filled) spacecraft.
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I learned something new today. Thanks for that link.
With respect to the vacuum packed moon dust, I'm a little surprised that they weren't stored in a (larger) vacuum-sealed room as soon as the first one scratched through its bag.
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It caught them by surprise. Moon dust turned out to be a lot more problematic of a substance than was initially expected. In some ways, not in others. There were lots of worries about moon dust before NASA got there... most famously that the dust layer may be so deep and loose that it would just swallow up a spacecraft. Another hypothesis that wasn't retired until after the moon landings was that, due to its reduced nature, that it might be pyrophorric in contact with air - either immediately, or with a
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Since the Lunar samples are stored under nitrogen to prevent exactly this occurrence, not buying it. Got a reference?
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Reference [space.com] and another [wikipedia.org]
Sorry, try again. (Score:2)
Did you actually read your references? Do you know how to evaluate claims against other evidence?
The first reference completely fails to support your claim. The second (when you follow the footnote) fails to mention that the samples are stored in nitrogen and thus it's claims are highly suspect.
Try again when you have an actual reference that supports your claim, and in the meantime learn basic reading comprehension and analysis skills.
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From the first reference:
"People should not assume that the Apollo lunar soil samples remain representative of soils found in the natural environment of the moon, especially if they have been exposed to air," she told Space.com via email. "In addition to particle size distribution, other geotechnical properties (such as strength and cohesion) must also have changed. Also, for example, water found in the sample might be taken to be lunar in origin when in fact it is the result of contamination."
If samples stored in nitrogen
"Based on other evidence, it's possible that even the samples stored in nitrogen may be compromised," Cooper said.
If samples stored in nitrogen may be compromised the what samples are definitely not compromised?
From the second reference:
Although this material has been isolated in vacuum-packed bottles, it is now unusable for detailed chemical or mechanical analysis – the gritty particles deteriorated the knife-edge indium seals of the vacuum bottles; air has slowly leaked in.
It does not matter what gas the samples were stored in if air leaks in. The air will mil with the gas and contaminate the sample.
How about this one;
The various rocks and soil samples were placed in “rock boxes.” These were sealed at 10-12 torr on the Moon, only to be found to be at 1 atmosphere
when opened in the Lunar Receiving Lab (LRL) at Johnson Space Center in Houston. [Author L.A. Taylor was in
the LRL at that time.] The presence of the ‘clinging’ lunar dust had made the indium, knife-edge seals fail. This
dust was so pervasive that no lunar rock boxes from any of the 6 Apollo missions to the Moon ever maintained their
lunar vacuum -- they all leaked.
Notice this NASA paper also makes no mention of nitrogen.
How about this one [cleveland.com];
Another indicator is that all of the environmental sample and gas sample seals failed because of dust. By the time they reached earth the
samples were so contaminated as to be worthless.
Maybe you should learn to use Google before attacking someone.
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Sorry I fouled up on the link in the third reference [nasa.gov]. Where is your "other evidence"?
Nope, try again. (Score:2)
The operative words here are MAY BE , where you pronounced the definitely are.
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Yes, it does matter - because nitrogen isn't air, it's inert. It can't contaminate the sample.
When common air mixes with the nitrogen due to compromised seals the material can be contaminated.
You completely ignored the third citation from a NASA document that state clearly "This dust was so pervasive that no lunar rock boxes from any of the 6 Apollo missions to the Moon ever maintained their lunar vacuum -- they all leaked."
So where is your evidence to the contrary? You have yet to present any research at all.
You don't believe the seals on the containers were compromised by the regolith. Show your p
*rolls eyes* (Score:3, Interesting)
Now we know how to grow food on Mars!
Step 1: Be on Earth, with Earth Gravity.
Step 2: Grow your food in an oxygenated, normal earth atmosphere.
Step 3: Build a big warehouse, climate controlled, not subjected to martian weather or extremes.
Step 4: Use desert soil.
Step 5: When all of that fails, add fresh compost and grass, with plenty of water.
I'm not sure how any of this works as "simulated" lunar and martian soil. If they had taken inert soil, or diatomaceous earth (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatomaceous_earth)....that would have been a start.
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Not to mention FTFA:
The growing took place in a greenhouse with consistent temperature, humidity and light conditions, and under earth atmosphere. "This is because we expect that first crop growth on Mars and moon will take place in underground rooms to protect the plants from the hostile environment including cosmic radiation," says team member Dr. Wieger Wamelink.
And no, the harvested crops weren't eaten. The soils contained heavy metals such as lead, arsenic and mercury, and there were concerns that thes
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This should be the big showstopper. The whole purpose of growing plants on Mars or the Moon are for future astronauts to eat. If the astronauts can't eat them because the plants pulls toxic compounds from the soil, then what's the purpose of growing them in the first place? Why not just use hydroponics?
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There's no indication that Martian soil contains those toxins. They used volcanic soil so that it would be free of microbes and biomatter; the toxins were a side effect of that, not necessarily a reflection of the soil expected on Mars.
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Yeah, mars soil is much, MUCH worse. There's links all over this very page for sources.
Read the book and saw the movie (Score:2)
They should have tried poo (Score:2)
Comment (Score:5, Funny)
So they literally scienced the shit out of it?
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Actually, one of the most important areas of study would precisely be trying to grow plants there. What else are they going to do all day? Make sandcastles? Once they've analyzed the soil, there's not really that much to study. Staying alive, growing stuff and producing energy, those are the things they will be most interested in.
Canals (Score:1)
hydroponic horticulture (Score:2)
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Who needs soil? (Score:4, Interesting)
Technically, you don't need soil to grow something. It's called hydroponics. In an emergency situation (The Martian), yes, it's easier to use soil, as you don't need as much water, no pumps, timers, etc. But if you are planning for it, why not go for pure hydroponics?
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Exactly. There's a growing technique called the Mittleider method. It's been around for decades, but I've only just discovered it. The claim (backed up by a lot of history, experience, and science) is that plants need 16 different nutrients (not just NPK). So you start with NPK and add in the other trace elements. In his system, you put the same measured amount of fertilizer on the plants every week. They adjust for different uptakes from different types of plants by adjusting plant spacing. You can
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In his system, you put the same measured amount of fertilizer on the plants every week.
Where will this highly refined fertilizer come from on Mars?
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Plants don't grow well in distilled water. Hydroponics requires a lot of fertilizer in the water to allow growth. Feces in is a limited supply.The nutrients have to come from somewhere.
It isn't soil if it is only inorganic. (Score:3)
It's only soil if it has mechanical properties (Score:3)
Naw, what you're describing is Dirt. Soil is what we build buildings on and it had defined engineering properties such as internal friction angles, various moduli of elasticity and compression, and other useful things. (aka, each discipline has it's own definition of what "soil" is - and to CEs it has nothing to do with biology ;-)
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Where will the materials that we need to inoculate the media with come from. If it is from Earth it would be a lot of weight to transport to Mars and would need to be resupplied regularly.
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Most people (including the civil engineer in this thread) don't appreciate how complex soils are, but forming a soil from the regolith ("broken rocks") already present on the surface of the Moon and Mars (and the Atacama, and Antarctica, and fresh volcanoes) isn't that hard. Yes, you'll need your "starter innoculants" of fungi, humus, or
Well, there's proof for ya! (Score:2)
Indeed, in the recent hit movie, "The Martian," Matt Damon's character grew potatoes to survive long enough to be rescued.
So, umm, I guess that means that we have already proved it can be done????
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Agreed. Kill yourself to accelerate the solution.
Re: To the mooonnnn..... (Score:1)