Elon Musk’s SpaceX has announced it’s going to send coffee and cannabis into space as a part of a scientific experiment after teaming up with Front Range Biosciences, a Colorado-based research lab.
As for the reason why 480 plant cell cultures will be traveling to the International Space Station in the beginning of 2020, the spacecraft manufacturing giant said they wanted to test how the plants will act in zero-gravity conditions.
To ensure the success of the project, Front Range Biosciences partnered with a startup called Space Cells and the University of Colorado.
The plants are predicted to be sent into space in March 2020 when the SpaceX CRS-20 aircraft takes off.
After being taken to the International Space Station, the plants will be placed in an incubator and observed for approximately one month.
Following their return to the Earth, the researchers will examine the specimens to try and determine how one month in space affected them.
“This is one of the first times anyone is researching the effects of microgravity and spaceflight on hemp and coffee cell cultures,” Front Range Biosciences CEO and co-founder Dr. Jonathan Vaught expressed.
“There is science to support the theory that plants in space experience mutations. This is an opportunity to see whether those mutations hold up once brought back to earth and if there are new commercial applications.”
“We are excited to learn more about both hemp and coffee gene expression in microgravity and how that will inform our breeding programs,” Reggie Gaudino of Front Range added in a statement.
As for future goals, the participating parties hope to allow crews in space to be able to raise, preserve, and harvest plants on their own.
“In the future, we plan for the crew to harvest and preserve the plants at different points in their grow-cycle, so we can analyze which metabolic pathways are turned on and turned off. This is a fascinating area of study that has considerable potential,” UC’s BioServe Space Technologies Director Louis Stodieck said.
What are your thoughts on this announcement? Let us know in the comments and don’t forget to SHARE this post with your family and friends and follow us on Facebook for more news and stories!
Replaced!