A test to boldly grow food in space laboratories, explodes

The steak, potato puree and desserts for astronauts can soon be grown from individual cells in space, if the experiment launched into orbit today is successful.

The European Space Agency (ESA) project assesses the viability of so -called laboratory food in low gravity and higher radiation in orbit and in other worlds.

ESA finances the study to study new ways to reduce the cost of feeding astronaut, which can cost up to 20,000 pounds per day.

Participation in the team claims that the experiment is the first step to develop a small pilot food plant at the International Space Station in two years.

The food grown in the laboratory will be important if the purpose of the NASA-to-do humanity is a multiple species that must be realized, claims that Dr. Akeel Shamsul, CEO and founder of Bedford Frontier Space, who develops this concept with the researchers of the Imperial College in London.

“Our dream is to have factories in orbit and on the moon,” he said BBC News.

“We need to build production facilities through the world, if we provide infrastructure so that people can live and work in space.”

Laboratory food provides for the cultivation of dietary ingredients such as protein, fat and carbohydrates in test pipes and vats, and then handles them to look and taste as usual food.

The chicken grown in the laboratory is already sold in the US, and Singapore and the laboratory are grown steak, awaits approval in the UK and Israel. Earth has stated environmental advantages for technology compared to traditional agricultural food production methods such as less use of land and reduced greenhouse gas emissions. But in space, the main driver is a reduction in costs.

Researchers conduct an experiment because it costs so much to send the astronaut to the ISS – up to 20,000 pounds per day, they estimate.

NASA, other space agencies and private sector companies plan to have a long -term presence on the moon, at orbit space stations and possibly once on Mars. This will mean sending food for dozens and in the end, hundreds of astronauts who live and work in space – what would be very expensive if it was sent to the rockets, Dr. Shamsul reports.

It suggests that growing food in space would have a much greater meaning.

“We could start with a potato puree, intensified protein, to more complex products we could collect into space,” he tells me.

“But in the long run, we could put the ingredients grown in the laboratory in 3D printer and print everything you want at the space station, such as steak!”

This sounds like replicators on Star Trek that are able to produce food and pure energy. But this is no longer a science fiction, says D -R Shamsul.

He showed me an installation called a biorector at the imperial center of sustainable proteins at the Imperial College in West London. It consisted of a brick-colored rampant that was belly in the test tube. The process is known as a precise fermentation, which is similar to the fermentation used to prepare beer, but different: “accuracy” is a rebranding word for genetically engineered.

In this case, the gene was added to the yeast for additional vitamins, but all sorts of ingredients can be produced in this way, according to Dr. Rodrigo-Amara, director of the Bezoos Center.

“We can make all the elements to cook food,” Dr. Lelesma-Amara says proudly.

“We can make proteins, fats, carbohydrates, fibers, and they can be combined to make different dishes.”

A much smaller, easier version of Birectors was sent to space on the SpaceX Falcon 9 missile as part of the ESA mission. There is a lot of evidence that the products can successfully grow from the cells on the ground, but can it be repeated process in intenseness and higher space radiation?

Dr. Ledezma-Amara and Shamsul sent a small number of yeast to orient the land in a small cube satellite in Europe in Europe spacecraft, phoenix. If everything goes according to the plan, it will be orbit of the Earth about three hours before heading to the ground off the Portugal coast. The experiment will be obtained by the recovery vessel and sent back to the London laboratory for review.

According to Dr. Lelesma-Amara, the data they collect will report the construction of a larger, best biorector, which scientists will send to space next year.

The problem, however, is that the brick color, which dries into the powder, looks clearly non-apethized-naughty less appetizing than the dried tariff from which the astronauts should now put up.

It is here that the master -shaf -the Kuhar of the Imperial College comes. Jakub Radikovsky is a designer of culinary education, which instructed to turn chemistry into a kitchen.

He is not allowed to use laboratory ingredients to make dishes for people because regulatory approval is still considered. But it gets started. So far, instead of laboratory ingredients, Jakub uses starch and natural mushrooms to develop their recipes. He tells me that all sorts of dishes will be possible as soon as it gets a blow to use the ingredients that grow in the laboratory.

“We want to create food, familiar astronauts that are from different parts of the world so that it can provide comfort.

“We can create anything from French, Chinese, Indian. You can repeat any kitchen in space.”

Today, Jakub is trying a new recipe for sharp dumplings and plouts. He tells me that I am allowed to try them, but the chief tagor is someone much more qualified: Helen Charman, the first astronaut in the UK, who also has a doctoral degree in chemistry.

We tried pairs together.

My look: “They are absolutely wonderful!”

Dr. Charman’s expert look is not incomparable: “You get a really strong explosion from the fragrance. It’s really delicious and very more,” she changed.

“I would like something similar. When I was in space, I had really long things: cans, frozen dried packages, pipes. It was fine, but not delicious.”

More important observation by Dr. Charman was about science. According to her, the laboratory food may be better for astronauts, as well as reduce the costs to the levels needed in order to make long -term housing housing viable.

ISS studies have shown that the biochemistry of the astronauts’ bodies changes over a long time: their hormones balance and iron level change, and they lose calcium from their bones. The astronauts take supplements to compensate, but in principle, which is grown in the laboratory, you can adjust the additional ingredients that are already built, says Dr. Sharman.

“The astronauts tend to lose weight because they don’t go so much because they have no diversity and interest in their diet,” she told me.

“So, astronauts can be more open for what has been prepared from scratch and the feeling that you really eat useful food.”

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