
NASA Is Trying to Grow Potatoes on Mars - T-A
http://www.wsj.com/articles/nasa-really-is-trying-to-grow-potatoes-on-mars-1460560325
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stcredzero
One of the meaningful bits of engineering one can do on Earth for furthering
Martian agriculture, is the recycling of water. It's going to cost energy and
worker-time to extract water out of the soil. Even machinery that condenses
water out of the Martian air will require energy and maintenance. (Possibly
passive structures that condense water?)

For this reason, we may want to research habitats that can almost completely
retain moisture in the form of water vapor and extract it out of the air. Such
requirements are quite uncommon for structures on Earth, doubly so if you also
add in the requirements of enclosing useful agricultural acreage and
pressurization. Submarines are probably good at doing this, but the price per
square meter of floor would be prohibitive. We'd want to be able to build such
structures on Mars from in-situ resources.

Building such structures on Earth and growing crops like potatoes within them
would constitute worthwhile research in preparation of colonizing Mars.

(One side effect of such research might be the ability to settle and develop
land in places like West Texas, much of which gets very little rain and has
land that sells at single-digit dollar prices.)

~~~
ryanhuff
If you haven't yet, listen to one of the recent episodes of Star Talk Radio
(Season 7, Episodes 4). They have Any Weir, author of "The Martian", and Dr.
Jim Green, Director of NASA’s Planetary Science Division. Dr. Green describes
how they now think extracting water from the Martian soil may be as simple as
heating up soil. Supposedly, the Martian soil contains roughly 35 liters of
water for every cubic meter of soil.

~~~
pilsetnieks
From "The Martian":

> Fortunately, I have water. But not as much as I want. To be viable, soil
> needs 40 liters of water per cubic meter. My overall plan calls for 9.2
> cubic meters of soil. So I’ll eventually need 368 liters of water to feed
> it.

> The Hab has an excellent Water Reclaimer. Best technology available on
> Earth. So NASA figured “why send a lot of water up there? Just send enough
> for an emergency.” Humans need 3 liters of water per day to be comfortable.
> They gave us 50 liters each. There are 300 liters total in the Hab.

So if the soil already has 35 liters per cubic meter, he would have actually
needed just 46 liters of additional water and wouldn't have needed to muck
about with hydrazine.

~~~
ArtDev
Its my understanding that the moisture content of martian soil was not know
when the book was written.

There is more moisture and water ice found rather recently than we had
previously estimated.

~~~
pilsetnieks
Oh, I know that, and I love the book and movie, I just thought that it was
ironic that it was a talk with Andy Weir.

As science progresses, he could in fact publish new editions of "The Martian"
with the relevant stuff corrected, a la Ridley Scott's numerous editions of
Blade Runner, or, God forbid, Lucas' editions of Star Wars.

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yincrash
An interesting piece of trivia, while potatoes are in cuisine across the world
now, they are native to the Americas (which is briefly mentioned in the
article). It's ability to feed many (being caloricly dense), as well as being
fairly rugged allowed it to create Europe's population boom and urbanization
when it was introduced there. Let's hope the same can be done to Mars!

~~~
JorgeGT
However in many places people were unsure if they were fit for human
consumption! For instance the Paris Faculty of Medicine only declared them
edible in 1772 mainly by the efforts of Antoine-Augustin Parmentier.

He did publicity stunts such as potato dinners featuring honorable gusts like
Lavoisier and Benjamin Franklin, or (my favorite) surrounding his potato
garden with lots of guards... only to instruct them to accept any bribe and be
extra sloppy guarding the garden, allowing interested villagers to "steal" the
potatoes.

~~~
kriro
Frederick the Great's "potato marketing" is a pretty great story. He was
convinced the potato would help grow and nourish the population so he tried to
enact it as "people food" via law. The people did not take to it. He then
devised the genius plan of having potato fields guarded by soldiers who were
secretly told to take naps and/or sleep at night and let people steal the
potatoes. People being people some citizens figured it must be valuable and
great stuff if it's guarded and the "hot new food of kings" spread pretty
quickly.

There's usually potatoes on his grave to this day :)

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a3n
> As humans prepare to blast off to Mars, there is still the question of what
> they’ll eat once they colonize the red planet. Scientists who have traveled
> here to the Peruvian desert say they have the answer. Potatoes.

Followed by the Great Martian Potato Famine, and then signs in the windows of
Earth businesses stating "No Martians."

~~~
fucking_tragedy
Martians Need Not Apply

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vinchuco
It would be ironic if something were to happen to us and potatoes became the
life form that colonized space.

~~~
overcast
What's the irony here?

~~~
vinchuco
We tend to think of the human species landing on the moon as an isolated
species achievement.

The human view of our future is usually of us colonizing space independently,
not of us wanting to spread earthly life forms across the universe.

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kobayashi
>Mars One, a Dutch nonprofit foundation, plans to send individuals to the
planet in about 10 years on a one-way trip to establish a permanent colony.

Come on. A journalist from a serious publication is still talking about Mars
One as anything other than a large scam? Ridiculous.

~~~
chrisdotcode
Why do you think that Mars One is a scam? Is it not feasible to get humans to
Mars in ~10 years?

~~~
logfromblammo
It has been _technically_ feasible to get humans to Mars for decades already.
It has only recently become _economically_ feasible. And we likely have a few
more years to go before it becomes _politically_ feasible.

The sticking point has never been the tech. It has always been the people. And
in my opinion, Mars One does not have the right people to produce a successful
mission.

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SCAQTony
"... If they grow successfully, the potatoes will then be planted in a
simulator that factors in the atmospheric conditions on Mars. ..."

Will it also simulate the cosmic rays Mars has to endure and can these rays be
duplicated?

~~~
siculars
May I bathe in these rays and become and X-Man or Fantastic Fifth?

~~~
Luyt
The rays are ionizing and will smash apart the DNA molecules in living cells.

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xfactor973
I hope they're planning on taking TPS or true potato seeds with them. You
could fit a million true potato seeds in a small pouch and you'd be set for a
long time :)

~~~
SCAQTony
I suspect Monsanto will "have to Science the shit" into these potatoes and
create new GMO strains to fight the cold, the radiation and low water
availability.

I would rather have another James Webb telescope or send a few hundred probes
to Alpha Centauri with the money it will cost to go to Mars.

~~~
manicdee
Icelanders manage to grow decent crops in greenhouses.

There is no reason to suggest that Martians should operate any differently.

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verytrivial
To recreate the surface air pressure of Mars, this experiment should be taking
place at an altitude roughly five times the height of Everest or a similarly
evacuated chamber. Mars is _harsh_. (Edit: i.e. yes, all agriculture will
likely need to take place under the sort of structures you see on the cover of
sci-fi novels from 60s and 70s).

~~~
Luyt
Indeed. They mention the composition of the atmosphere, but the low pressure
is conveniently forgotten about. The Mars atmosphere is like a vacuum: 0.00628
atm. Earth atmosphere normal pressure is 1 atm. Essentially, being on the
surface of Mars is being in space. And what about the radiation? Mars has no
magnetic field like Earth has. So the Solar Wind has free play on the surface.

~~~
optforfon
Which makes living on the Moon suddenly not look so bad!

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fiftyacorn
I'll kick off the study to produce vodka on Mars and we'll be sorted for
colonisation of Mars

~~~
type0
That's also a good way to get russians onboard

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ortusdux
I wonder if this would be a good application for one of these tomato-potato
grafted plants.

[http://www.territorialseed.com/product/grafted-tomtato-
ketch...](http://www.territorialseed.com/product/grafted-tomtato-ketchup-n-
fries)

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NoGravitas
Just finished reading _Red Mars_ and am now reading _Green Mars_, so this is
relevant to my interests.

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sslayer
Didn't Mark Wahlberg already do this?

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cwkoss
Sounds like someone at NASA read The Martian...

~~~
ortusdux
Probably someone in the marketing dept.

~~~
jessaustin
I would expect NASA to be more concerned with "public relations" than
"marketing".

I know, "potato, potAHto"...

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known
Leave Mars alone;

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awqrre
They should have done corn for the high-fructose corn syrup ... because
apparently we need it in everything.

