Chickpeas Grown in Lunar Regolith Are Stressed but Reach Maturity

Image of the chickpea plants after five weeks displaying a diversity of chlorophyll. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Jessica Atkins)

A recent preprint investigates how chickpeas have been successfully grown in lunar regolith simulants (LRS), marking the first time such a guideline has been established not only for chickpeas, but also for growing food for long-term human space missions. This study was conducted by researchers from Texas A&M University and Brown University and holds the potential to develop more efficient methods in growing foods using extraterrestrial resources, specifically with NASA’s Artemis program slated to return humans to the lunar surface in the next few years.

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As Temperatures Rise, Antarctica is Turning Green

Signy Island in the South Orkney Islands. Image Credit: By Ben Tullis from Cambridge, United Kingdom - Signy, the base and the bay, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5878735

The global climate is warming, and Earth’s polar regions are feeling the effects. A new study of the South Orkney Islands shows that the region has warmed significantly since the 1950s. The rise in warming in the South Orkneys exceeds the overall global warming.

As the islands warm, plant life is spreading.

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