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How is this much different than growing within a space station in orbit? Didn’t the plant grow in its own mini biosphere (soil) separate from the moon surface,
by ryanhuff 7y ago
How is this much different than growing within a space station in orbit? Didn’t the plant grow in its own mini biosphere (soil) separate from the moon surface, essentially isolated from the lunar environment other than light and heat?
- t0mbstone 7y agoMaybe the moon's gravity? Or temperature cycle differences?
- knodi123 7y agoFrom the article, "But, the plants will not be able to survive the lunar night, when temperatures dip down to -170 degrees Celsius."
- aeternum 7y agoI wonder if that part was expected or if something broke down. Strange to go to all the work of planting a seed and creating the proper environment with light routing knowing that it will last only a single lunar day. Seems likely that the insulation or power system did not work as designed.
- WalterSear 7y agoOr this was just a propaganda play.
- kop316 7y agoI'd suspect it's a "tack on" experiement. They were doing a bunch of experiments and wanted to see if a plant could even germinate in a low gravity environment. Now that they know it can germinate, it is worth the money to see if i t could last longer.
- arbuge 7y agoPartially isolated. The article mentions that it died during the 14 day lunar night.
- Baeocystin 7y agoWell, it's undergoing a ~1.6m/s gravitational acceleration instead of earth's ~9.8, or the microgravity of the space station. Even from the small amount of growth seen in the photo, it looks like that's enough for it to orient its stem better than space station grown plants. That strikes me as interesting.
- peter303 7y agoI searched google for a plant growing in actual Moon soil (regolith) and found nothing. Several labs have tried simulated Moon soil. Chang'e used a bioreactor rather than Moon soil.