The Coral Plant is a stunning tropical shrub that can add a touch of exotic beauty to any garden or indoor space. It gets its name from its attractive coral-like appearance and unique foliage!
21.08.2023 - 11:47 / theunconventionalgardener.com / Emma Doughty / Join Emma
Join Emma the Space Gardener as she explores gardening on Earth… and beyond! In this episode, Emma talks to Grace Crain, a researcher on the MELiSSA project developing circular life support systems.
Since the last episode, NASA’s Perseverance rover has landed on Mars and started sending back hi-res images of the red planet.
Professor Volker Hessel from the University of Adelaide sent some pills into space on NG-15. They’ll spend six months on the outside of the International Space Station, to see how they fare in the space environment. They’ll be stashed in the Materials International Space Station Experiment (MISSE) platform, along with eleven varieties of seeds.
Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi is growing sweet basil in space, and tweeting a photo of the plants’ progress every day. This is part of the Asian Herb in Space program.
I released this episode on International Women’s Day, a global day celebrating women’s social, economic, cultural and political achievements. The theme for 2021 is #ChooseToChallenge, and I am thrilled to have Grace Crain as my guest for this show. Grace is currently working on her PhD at ETH Zurich, in collaboration with the Melissa project. Her research into closed-loop systems challenges our ideas about waste and our place in this vast ecosystem we call Home.
Grace mentions two practical applications of closed-loop technology here on Earth. The first is the Semilla Sanitation hub I have blogged about – a mobile toilet block that recycles water to grow mint for tea! The second is the La Trappe Brewery the Netherlands, which makes their beer production 100% circular by using the technology developed for the ISS astronauts:
I mentioned that we have a kerbside collection for food waste that goes
The Coral Plant is a stunning tropical shrub that can add a touch of exotic beauty to any garden or indoor space. It gets its name from its attractive coral-like appearance and unique foliage!
Header image: Mizuna lettuce growing aboard the International Space Station before being harvested and frozen for return to Earth. Image credit: NASA
It’s hard to imagine anyone being more excited about eating lettuce than the three astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) were yesterday, when they tucked into the first leaves of space-grown lettuce they’ve been allowed to eat. Despite having to sanitise the leaves first, with citric-acid-based, food-safe, antibacterial wipes (yummy!), they broke out the oil and vinegar and tucked in with gusto. They even thanked Mission Control and the scientists for giving them the opportunity to take part in this payload mission, and saved some veggies for the Russian cosmonauts who were outside on a spacewalk at harvest time.
This is a really fun video (12:24 long) from Adam Savage’s Tested series, in which a chef tries to help astronauts on the ISS eat nicer meals by combining foods they already have in stock. Chris Hadfield is their astronaut guinea pig, and demonstrates very effectively why it’s so hard to prepare meals in space!
Today is the first day of National Plants at Work Week, which aims to promote the use and benefits of indoor plants. You may have been eyeing up the windowsills in your office with a view to growing your own chillies or sweet peppers, but did you know that you can grow your own fresh air too?
If there’s a plant that’s destined to explode onto the Grow Your Own scene this year, then it has to be agretti (Salsola soda). Agretti got good press last year as being a vegetable sought-after by chefs; it didn’t hurt that seed was in short supply! Suppliers have taken note, however, and there are plenty more sources this year.
Rupesh Paudyal, University of Leeds
Header image: Mission specialist Sally Ride became the first American woman to fly in space. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center
When Neil Armstrong made his giant leap for humankind in 45 years ago, he got covered in Moon dust. Throughout the Apollo missions, dust was an issue. Fine but rough, it caused problems with the space suits, and created mini dust storms in the cabin once the landers launched back into space.
Can we grow food on the Moon or Mars? That was the question that started Dr Wieger Wamelink, ecologist and exobiologist at the University of Wageningen in the Netherlands, on a research quest in 2013.
It’s time to cut down on your carbon footprint and help lock carbon in the soil, and the good news is that this doesn’t have to be a self-sacrificing activity, it can be a win-win situation if you choose to grow your own food!
Join Emma the Space Gardener as she explores gardening on Earth… and beyond! Emma’s guest on this week’s show is Dr Gioia Massa, a Project Scientist at the NASA Kennedy Space Center, working on the Veggie growing system on the International Space Station. Gioia talks about the challenges of growing plants in space, those blooming space zinnias, and when we might see astronauts eating their first space tomato!