The Moon Society Forum

http://sci2.esa.int/Conferences/ILC2005 ... 01-DOC.pdf

excerpt: Abstract. It may be assumed that the first plants in a lunar base will play a main role in forming a protosoil of acceptable fertility needed for
purposively growing second generation plants like wheat, rice, tulips, etc. The residues of the first-generation plants could be composted and
transformed by microorganisms into a soil-like substrate within a loop of regenerative life support system. The lunar regolith may be used as a
substrate for plant growth at the very beginning of a mission to reduce its cost. The use of microbial communities for priming plants will allow to
facilitate adaptation to stressful conditions and to support the plant development under growth limiting conditions.

I would like to make a clarification with regard to the Lunax project. It is not really about initiation of a horticultural system on the first Moon Base. This technology is well advanced and will almost certainly involve the kind of sophisticated hydroponics system used by the Controlled Environment Agriculture Center (CEAC)at the University of Arizona at Tucson. Dr. Gene Giacomelli Director of CEAC and Phil Sadler of Sadler Engineering have an operating lunar green house prototype system in Tucson as of March 2009. Their food production system developed at CEAC has also proven itself at the South Pole in Antarctic. With National Science Foundation funding it has been in operation for several years (since at least 2007) and serves by nutritional needs by supplying a variety of pants for fresh salads twice a week as well a morale needs of the base at the by having an intensively lighted environment with green plants for the crew to utilize and enjoy.


Lunax Generation II is more focused the adaptation of terrestrial plants to lunar conditions including a lunar lighting schedule and the use of in situ materials as a substrate for plant growth but also looking at the issue of soil amendments, and looking at growth in partial pressure environments. Our small research group is also interested in terrestrial applications of this plant extremophile orientation to look at how high altitude agriculture might be improved. At various place around the world indigenous peoples have been pushed up into high elevations with poor regolithic soils, rapidly changing environmental conditions which make self sufficiency and economic independence difficult. This work is not competitive with sophisticated horticultural system because the purpose is to learn about the adaptation potential of extremophile plants to new circumstances.

We indeed are looking at the evolution of mature biological soils from in situ materials as a function of plant activity, microbial activity, processing of in situ materials utilized for plant substrates, and amendments from Earth materials. This is a long term
perspective and more of a basic research focus than that of the work at CEAC.

In contrast the goal of creating an economic presence on the Moon will require a cost effective bioregenerative life support system with a very intensive rate of food production per square meter, recycling organic materials and plant waste by products, and supplying atmospheric and water conditioning. These requirements are well along the technology readiness level curve at CEAC with their cable culture hydroponics system, advanced composting, and water condensation & recycling. The goal of these bioregenerative CELSS systems is to produce as much nutritional variety as possible within the least surface area and volume, with the least mass and to cross a cost effectiveness curve in comparison with systems with rely on physico-chemical life support technologies which are also dependent on a supply chain from Earth.


The immediate goals of Lunax I were educational goals raising these issues and letting students try some inexpensive experiments as a matter of educational outreach.

Our interest at present is to develop a biological payload that could carry a higher order extremophile plant to the lunar surface on an International Lunar Network lander that could survive for several lunar days sheltered from temperature and radiation extremes by being buried in a trench but could also utilize surface samples, sampling technology, and associated geophysical instruments to documents its growth activity and response to the lunar environment and lunar samples used as substrate. We also have a student focus in Lunax II and are working with students at the College of Menominee Nation, the El Paso Community College,
and a student at a University in India.

A Cactus plant has already survived 9 lunar cycles and is thriving on a lunar light schedule and cycling temperature system growing in JSC#1, and amended with pyrogenic-C. We are now moving into work on a reduced pressure regime to see how well the plant can make this further adaptation.

A plant chamber development program has been started and we are planning for flight tests on NASA suborbital rockets and potentially high altitude balloons to "space qualify" these systems.

We are also starting to map out synergies between geophysical instrumentation already planned for ILN missions and experimentation which will demonstrate the adaptation potential of an extremophile plant on the lunar surface. We are also
looking similarly at the Mars Science Lab Rover instrumentation set for potential synergies as well.
Dave Dunlop -