Scientists have grown plants on lunar soil for the first time


Scientists have grown plants on the soil of the Moon, a first in human history and a milestone in lunar and space exploration. A team from the University of Florida showed that plants can successfully sprout and grow in lunar soil, a first step toward one day growing plants for food and oxygen on the Moon or during space missions. Their study, published in the journal Communications Biology, also investigated how plants respond biologically to soil on the Moon, also known as lunar regolith, which is radically different from soil found on Earth. Lunar soil, 12 grams or just a few teaspoons, was collected during the Apollo 11, 12 and 17 missions to the Moon.

To grow their little lunar garden, the researchers used thimble-sized wells in plastic dishes normally used to grow cells.

Each well functioned like a pot. Once they filled each “pot” with about a gram of lunar soil, the scientists moistened the soil with a nutrient solution and added some seeds from the Arabidopsis plant.

Arabidopsis is widely used in plant science because its genetic code has been fully mapped.

As points of comparison, the researchers also planted Arabidopsis in JSC-1A, a terrestrial substance that mimics real lunar soil, as well as simulated Martian soils and terrestrial soils from extreme environments. Plants grown on these non-lunar soils were the control group for the experiment.

The results showed that almost all the seeds planted in the lunar soils sprouted.

“We were amazed. We didn’t predict that. That told us that the lunar soils did not disrupt the hormones and signals involved in plant germination,” said Anna-Lisa Paul, a research professor of horticultural sciences on the varsity team.

The “sprouted plants helped establish that soil samples brought back from the moon did not harbor pathogens or other unknown components that would harm terrestrial life, but those plants were only dusted with lunar regolith and never grown on it,” added Paul. . .

However, over time, the researchers observed differences between the plants grown in lunar soil and the control group. For example, some of the plants that grew on lunar soils were smaller, grew more slowly, or were more varied in size than their counterparts.

These were all physical signs that plants were working to cope with the chemical and structural makeup of the Moon’s soil, Paul explained. This was further confirmed when the researchers analyzed the gene expression patterns of the plants.

“At the genetic level, plants were putting out the tools normally used to deal with stressors, such as salt and metals or oxidative stress, so we can infer that plants perceive the lunar soil environment as stressful.” Paul said.

“Ultimately, we’d like to use gene expression data to help address how we can enhance stress responses to the level where plants, particularly crops, can grow in lunar soil with very little impact on their health.” “, he pointed.

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Reference-www.news18.com

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