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Will plants grow on the moon?
- 93po 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- cratermoon 2y agoSpoiler: this experiment is not going to try to grow plants in the lunar regolith. The "growth chamber" will be a hydroponic set up. The focus will be on the effects of unfiltered sunlight and all the various forms of radiation that are not present on earth because of the atmosphere.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- eric-hu 2y agoI am curious about how regolith would act as a growing medium.
- sampo 2y agoPlants grow, but not very well. https://www.nasa.gov/humans-in-space/scientists-grow-plants-in-lunar-soil/ https://www.nasa.gov/humans-in-space/scientists-grow-plants-...
- cratermoon 2y agoNote that the article says "A nutrient solution was added daily". The linked paper mentions "MS nutrient solution", meaning <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murashige_and_Skoog_medium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murashige_and_Skoog_medium>. In other words, the regolith served as a challenging substrate, as long as all the necessary nutrients were added. Without those additions, definitely not.
- Syonyk 2y agoI'll be very surprised if plants from Earth can tolerate the sort of high radiation environment that is the moon (or space in general, outside the magnetically shielded and atmospherically shielded bubble that is Earth). We tend to forget that the sun is an incredibly powerful and quite unshielded fusion reactor purring away, pushing 1000W/m^2 through our atmosphere. It's about 1400W/m^2 at 1AU (outside the Earth's sheltering fields and such) - and most of that difference is some really nasty, ionizing stuff. To the best of my knowledge, the moon is rather outside the Earth's magnetic shielding influence. But things will certainly be learned in the process!
- retrac 2y agoSome forms of life can tolerate remarkable levels of ionizing radiation, though I doubt anything terrestrial would survive a pass through Jupiter's radiation belts unshielded. It has been suggested that some fungi can extract useful energy from radiation: https://www.rsb.org.uk/biologist-features/eating-gamma-radiation-for-breakfast https://www.rsb.org.uk/biologist-features/eating-gamma-radia...
- RajT88 2y agoWe just have to figure out how to make Tardigrades gigantic and then farm them for meat. (I feel like this must have been a Futurama plot, and mist have ended poorly)
- mrec 2y agoI read the complete short stories of Arthur C. Clarke recently and one of the things that really struck me was that several of the early stories (long before NASA) had lunar-native plants growing wild on the Moon. For a hard SF writer I found that extraordinary; you forget just how much the speculative consensus has changed within quite a short period. In a similar vein, several of the early stories seem convinced by the evidence for psionics...
- WillAdams 2y agoBefore the advent of cell phones it seemed expedient to have telepathy for quick communication --- that said, Heinlein did predict them in his novel _Space Cadet_ (though they don't make more than a brief appearance).
- james_marks 2y agoFor those that don’t understand Clarke’s relation to cell phones: https://web.mit.edu/m-i-t/science_fiction/jenkins/jenkins_4.html#:~:text=Arthur%20C.,Clarke&text=After%20the%20crest%20of%20World,to%20the%20publication%20Wireless%20World https://web.mit.edu/m-i-t/science_fiction/jenkins/jenkins_4.....
- technothrasher 2y agoClarke had a pretty interesting progression from belief in many paranormal claims to hard core skeptic over his lifetime, and similarly from pantheist to atheist.
- 77pt77 2y agoAlso progression from gay to pedophile. https://www.thefreelibrary.com/It+doesn%27t+do+any+harm+...most+of+the+damage+comes+from+fuss+made+by...-a060659502 https://www.thefreelibrary.com/It+doesn%27t+do+any+harm+...m... There is so much corroborating evidence it's an almost certainty.
- gardaani 2y agoChinese already did a similar experiment few years ago and the result was that "plants can grow on the moon despite the intense radiation, low gravity, and prolonged intense light" https://phys.org/news/2023-10-china-tiny-farm-moon.html https://phys.org/news/2023-10-china-tiny-farm-moon.html
- Syonyk 2y ago> Over the next eight days, this payload conducted a vital experiment where it attempted to grow the first plants on the moon. The plants survived eight days before freezing, but important questions also include things like "How does the radiation impact their seed viability in future generations?" I'll grant that they didn't immediately die, but neither would I have expected that from an ionizing environment. Just a lot of weird quirks in lifecycle.
- Suppafly 2y agoYou can keep something alive for a week in a terrarium basically anywhere, I'm not even sure their result is interesting if it weren't for the fact that it was on the moon.
- bobthepanda 2y agoWe do need to prove basic assumptions on the fairly likely chance that they won’t pan out.
- seanw444 2y ago> if it weren't for the fact that it was on the moon. If it weren't for the entire reason they did the experiment in the first place?
- throw88888 2y agoIonized radiation is dangerous to mammals because of the potential DNA damage that we are so bad at repairing. Plants on the contrary tolerate much more damage. To the point that we develop new species by bombarding seeds with ionized radiation.
- jbverschoor 2y agoNo plants, just mold or fungus.. It's made of cheese.
- wakahiu 2y agoDo such kinds of experiments confound our search for extraterrestrial life? Mars and moon missions could introduce tiny life forms, that could be released into the environment. Some of these are extremely hardy (such as tardigrades) which could then start proliferating when conditions are right.
- ravenstine 2y agoThey'd definitely muddy the water, but wouldn't genetics confirm whether a life form is from Earth? (assuming other life even has anything resembling our form of genetics)
- sulam 2y agoNo, not least because the panspermia hypothesis says that DNA is in fact not originally from Earth.
- accrual 2y agoYep! There is very real concern about accidentally introducing Earth life on others moons and planets, and then "discovering" the introduced life instead of actual native life. As you mentioned with tardigrades, there are life forms and bacteria that could possibly survive a long duration flight through the vacuum of space, then proliferate once it reaches the surface somewhere. This is usually guarded against by various sterilization techniques applied to the spacecraft before launch, and there is a discipline dedicated to ensuring these events don't happen: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_protection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planetary_protection
- evilduck 2y agoMars, Earth and the Moon are close enough neighbors that rocks which could harbor life are already exchanged between them during impact events. Life found in deep granite rock on Earth: https://academic.oup.com/femsre/article/20/3-4/399/516507 https://academic.oup.com/femsre/article/20/3-4/399/516507 This recent one even discusses Mars being the origin of life and seeding Earth (panspermia) https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/10/241003123543.htm#:~:text=10/241003123543.htm-,Pockets%20of%20microbes%20have%20been%20found%20living%20within%20a%20sealed,samples%20brought%20back%20from%20Mars https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/10/241003123543.h.... Mars rocks found on Earth: https://www.space.com/mars-meteorites-on-earth-mystery https://www.space.com/mars-meteorites-on-earth-mystery Mars rocks being plausible candidates for harboring life: https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasa-discovers-mars-rock-with-ancient-potential-for-life https://www.planetary.org/articles/nasa-discovers-mars-rock-... I think reasonable caution by space agencies is wise but it also could have already happened a billion years ago. If we want to survive as a species or lineage of species beyond the Sun enveloping the Earth we will also need to deliberately establish viable life on other planets and even other solar systems at some point, previous historical records of ancestral life or present planetary sterility be damned. Life seems too rare in the universe for it to go down with the ship, we should make an effort to duplicate this experiment even if humanity doesn't make it.
- sampo 2y agoPeople have been growing plants in space stations since 1982. I don't see how growing plants in an isolated greenhouse on Moon would be much different. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plants_in_space#Space_station_era https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plants_in_space#Space_station_...
- zokier 2y ago> The response of plants to microgravity on the International Space Station is known, but “we know … almost nothing about how they and other organisms respond to partial gravity,” she says. > How they will respond to intense lunar radiation is perhaps the biggest question currently—the International Space Station orbits within the Earth’s magnetic field, and so it is exposed to much lower radiation levels than the lunar surface
- jmyeet 2y agoThere are a bunch of challenges to growing stuff on the Moon. The low gravity, the lack of defense from ioizing radiation that we have on Earth and, perhaps most importantly, the day/night cycle. The Moon is tidally locked with EArth so the da/night cycle is 28 days. Anywhere other than the poles and you'll have ~2 weeks of darkness every month. This affects how you can potentially generate power (ie it complicates solar power generation) but also plant growth. Ideally you want the plants to grow with passive light (ie light from the Sun) because that's "free". So any experiment should try and find out how plants do if they get 14 days of straight sunlight followed by 14 days of straight darkness. There are some plants you could grow in 14 days of sunlight even if nothing useful can survive the darkness (which, I believe, is unknown). You can spend energy to create light or you can use fiber optic cables to essentially passively pipe light around. I don't know if you can get the right wavelengths you need this way or if it's economically viable. As for radiation, it's less of an issue for plants but could still be an issue. It's worth finding out. But there are ways you can reduce this. You're going to need something transparent to get sunlight in. You can filter UV rays out to some degree depending on your material. You can even put water between the plants and the sun (ie a water tank between the plants and the Sun). Or if you can pipe sunlight around fiber optic cables you don't put your plaants on the surface at all. Your pressurize lava tubes instead. Or if energy becomes so ridiculously cheap that none of these are any problem at all.
- dylan604 2y agoGrow them in the lava tubes using mirrors to bounce the light around like the Egyptians used. Sounds like a fun game to be able to place the mirrors around the surface of the moon so that it still has light during the 2 weeks of darkness
- jmyeet 2y agoI'm curious how feasible it is to put reflectors in orbit around the Moon to create/extend day cycles. I actually found some literature on this [1]. [1]: https://hackaday.com/2024/04/03/space-mirrors-dreams-of-turning-the-night-into-day-around-the-clock/ https://hackaday.com/2024/04/03/space-mirrors-dreams-of-turn...
- dr_dshiv 2y agoIn a lecture I saw 10 years ago, Freeman Dyson advocated for teaching children to genetically engineer plants. He thought without the playful urge of children, we’d never be able to create “warm blooded” plants capable of surviving on asteroids and the moon. He pointed out that there is a greater surface area on the asteroid belt than all the planets. I still don’t know how he’d deal with atmosphere, but I love the vision. And, I learned that there are some exothermic plants, like Skunk Cabbage, that can chemically regulate their body temperature. Like I said, I love the vision.
- hinkley 2y agoLots of carbon and oxygen in asteroids if you pick the right ones. Some of the carbonaceous ones have some nitrogen as well. The big trick with smelting in space will be capturing all of the dust and smoke instead of losing the stuff and creating navigational hazards.
- WillAdams 2y agoHal Clement envisioned a genetically engineered organism able to enclose water in outer space in his short story "Raindrop" --- collected in _Space Lash_ (originally published as _Small Changes_), it is a remarkable collection of short stories, many of which are still relevant today.
- nomel 2y ago> I still don’t know how he’d deal with atmosphere Rye grass can survive at 0.07 atmosphere [1], or about 1 psi. Maybe some grid made of periodically anchored cables, covered in thin, transparent, polymer layers? Stacked layers could be used to limit conducted heat loss, repair urgency, and layer thickness requirement (layers would see pressure difference, probably also important for permiability). At night, pull a thin IR reflective layer over that's some microns thick, that lives out in the zero pressure side, to limit radiated losses. Once it's all going, maybe some bio plastic synthesis, to make plastics for repairs. [1] https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/19860010460 https://ntrs.nasa.gov/citations/19860010460
- aussieguy1234 2y agoTo grow plants anywhere, its important to remember that soil is not required and they can be grown entirely in water. I've done it several times with Kratky method hydroponics and no soil at all.
- sfink 2y agoI'm surprised that they chose 3 pretty complex plants. The duckweed seems like the best idea, but wouldn't it be more useful at this point to be experimenting with more primitive components of an ecosystem rather than full-fledged plants? Like algae and fungus and phytoplankton. It just seems like the question of whether a plant can survive and grow at all on the moon is not that different from whether a human can survive on the moon, and we already know that humans do pretty ok for limited time as long as you keep them in their spacesuits. I guess this is just figuring out what is required for a "plant spacesuit" to start working on extending how long one can last. I guess it's a top-down vs bottom-up philosophy, or something. I mean, even starting with phytoplankton, we'll have to provide missing nutrients. So it's not like you can just genetically engineer phytoplankton into terraforming the moon on their own. Unless you can figure out how to genetically engineer in a little nuclear reactor so the plants can produce their own missing elements...
- hasnain99 2y agowe have bring plant to the moon
- iambateman 2y agoPrediction: the plants will do exactly as well as the $7 IKEA plants I compulsively buy and then watch die.
- Etheryte 2y agoSmall side note: if you want your plants to survive, looking up the species and what care it needs can go a long way. Most potted plants don't want direct sunlight and don't want to be close to a source of heat (radiator) or cold (window this time of year). Many plants want to be watered in a specific way and don't want too much of it. That being said, some plants just die, that's the way it is.
- 0xDEAFBEAD 2y agoHas the moon been verified as sterile? Might be good to be sure of that before introducing life to it.