<i>The first batch of space-ready lettuce is something of a tease for the NASA crew — once harvested, it will be frozen and stored away for testing back on Earth. No one is allowed to eat anything before the plants are thoroughly vetted for cosmic microbes.<p>These space germs are often fairly benign, akin to the natural bacteria that build up in any moist root bank. Russian crews are allowed to consume vegetables grow on their side of the space station, but microbe standards are strict and unwavering on U.S. space missions.</i><p>That is the strangest part of the whole article. It's amazing how much science the USSR did on long term space habitation (including growing plants) that just gets ignored by NASA. Unfortunately I can't recall the title, but I read a book on the Soviet space program maybe 10 years ago that detailed all of the progress the USSR made prior to the US SkyLab program, and honestly they were 10-15 years ahead on that stuff compared to NASA.
I've recently gotten interested in this and have built my own aeroponics tank from a cheap plastic storage box and an ultrasonic fogger (together below $15, but nutrient and pH/TDS meters add a bit more to it). It's a fun experiment and worth trying down here in the gravity trap too - you can grow vegetables in a rental apartment with no garden if you have access to some sunlight (and even if you don't, by way of artificial light).<p>This video gave me the idea and instructions: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjWLyA-w4Bo" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjWLyA-w4Bo</a>
>Leafy greens are ideal, ready to be consumed as soon as they’re plucked [...] The most outlandish crops would be wheat and rice. [...P]lants that need processing make less attractive candidates for space travel.<p>Well, these "outlandish" cereal crops currently provide the bulk of calories for almost everyone on the planet. If you're serious about feeding astronauts in space, they are exactly the plants that you need to <i>start</i> with. And don't tell me equipment to grind wheat or hull rice would be complicated, compared with other stuff that's in orbit already.
Why is everything always the final frontier? Its kind of depressing that they said that space is the FINAL frontier. Does that mean we have nothing to aspire to after that? Now apparently the new "final frontier" is lettuce.
would love to see this done in space: <a href="http://www.biosphericproject.com/frontpage" rel="nofollow">http://www.biosphericproject.com/frontpage</a>
(A biospheric greenhouse project in Salford/Manchester, UK.