Space & Astronomy

Researchers grow plants on alien materials

By T.K. Randall
June 17, 2014

Image: Mars Greenhouse
Credit: (PD) NASA via Wikimedia Commons Most experiments that involve growing plants in space have typically involved growing them in as Earth-like an environment as possible aboard the space station or where the conditions on the surface of our own planet can be readily replicated.

Chemistry professor Michael Mautner however has been taking a different approach, instead opting to grow plants in materials taken from asteroids or other extraterrestrial environments.His main goal is to be able to grow plants on other worlds without having to rely on replicating Earth's environment in order to do so.

"People have been talking about terraforming, but what I'm trying to do is give some concrete evidence that it's possible to do this, that it's possible to grow in extraterrestrial materials," he said.

"What I've found is that a range of microorganisms - bacteria, fungi, and even asparagus and potato plants - can survive with the nutrients that are in extraterrestrial materials."

Source: CBS Local

Tags: Astroecology, Plants