Living concrete might help in environments harsher than even the driest deserts: other planets, like Mars. “There’s no way we’re going to carry building materi

Living concrete might help in environments harsher than even the driest deserts: other planets, like Mars. “There’s no way we’re going to carry building materials to space,” Dr. Srubar said. “We’ll bring biology with us.” The other day me and my friend were riffing on ideas regarding a game about a space courier. One issue was: given how expensive interstellar travel should be, what could possibly be so valuable as to justify the operation? Biology. It's possible that flinging hundreds of thousands vials (so as to have a good chance of catching at least one) with certain bacteria at relativistic speeds would be less expensive than coming up with a process of synthesizing the same features in a local species.