[ MUSIC ]
Station Science 101
Advancing Plant Science with Space Gardens
Gardens growing on the International Space Station
are leading to groundbreaking research and offering astronauts a taste of home.
Establishing fresh, reliable, and renewable food sources in space
is paramount for future long-duration missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
Astronauts on station grow plants in unique facilities.
A low-powered gardening chamber called "Veggie"
is equipped with adjustable lighting for experimentation.
Each plant grows in a "pillow" filled with a clay-based growth media and fertilizer.
The crew routinely looks after the plants and waters them by hand.
Tending to plants helps astronauts counter isolation and bolsters mental well-being in space.
The XROOTS system, which is integrated with the Veggie facility,
uses hydroponic and aeroponic techniques to grow plants without soil or other growth media.
This soilless system shows promise for future larger scale crop production in microgravity,
and could improve growing techniques and food security on Earth.
Another facility, the Advanced Plant Habitat is enclosed and automated.
Cameras and more than 180 sensors are in constant contact
with a team on the ground at NASA's Kennedy Space Center.
This allows researchers to help control the experiment,
freeing the crew's time to perform other tasks.
In these habitats, the crew has successfully grown various plants,
including lettuces, radishes, flowers, and even antioxidant rich foods such as tomatoes and peppers.
While some plants are consumed by the astronauts, others are sent back to Earth for analysis.
How plants change and adapt to microgravity is being studied
in hopes of developing solutions to produce fresh foods for future missions
and to help scientists cultivate plants in challenging environments back on Earth.
The lessons that we're learning from Veggie and the Advanced Plant Habitat
are also helping shape space crop production systems for future exploration missions.
As NASA continues to experiment with different plants and gardening systems
to find the most optimized solutions,
astronauts enjoy benefiting from the fruits, or the veggies, of their labors.