Students enrolled in a course offered by Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences this fall explored the possibility of growing food in space as part of NASA's Plant the Moon Challenge.
The project is a global science experiment, learning activity and project-based learning challenge to see who can grow the best crops using lunar regolith simulant. A lunar simulant is a granular or powder material that mimics one or more properties of the material found on the moon.
NASA's Artemis Program is the United States' new initiative to return to the moon. However, according to NASA, having humans on the moon is challenging in many ways, including how to feed the crew.
To help solve this dilemma, students in the general education course SOILS 71: Environmental Sustainability were tasked with transforming lunar regolith, which replicates the moon's surface, into a growth medium that can support plant life. Estelle Couradeau, assistant professor of soils and environmental microbiology, teaches the class, which is open to all majors.
SOILS 71 focuses on the importance of soil health and soil management for a sustainable future. The class covers the basics of soil science and includes field trips that help students understand sustainable practices around campus and how they connect to the soil. The class has visited the Student Farm at Penn State, the University's compost facility, campus green roofs, and the Centre County Recycling and Refuse Authority.
The course also includes general scientific literacy in the curriculum. "That's why I thought it would be interesting to participate in the Plant the Moon Challenge," said Couradeau. "The students get to design their experiment. They see firsthand how scientific knowledge is built."
For the challenge, students are divided into groups, and each group has its own sample of lunar regolith to amend. Christian Vazquez, of Miami, Florida, and Faith Warehime, of Hanover, are two students in the course.
Warehime said she was interested in this class because she is concerned about sustainability in society. Vazquez was looking ahead to his future career when he decided to take the course.
"The movement for sustainability and efficiency is causing companies to move toward green products and practices in their day-to-day business," Vazquez said. "I want to be proactive in gaining experience on sustainability for use in the future corporate world."
In their lunar samples, Vazquez and Warehime's group used oats because they are easy to grow, and clover because the legumes are known for the nitrogen-fixing bacteria in their roots, which helps amend the soil further.
"We're taking the lunar regolith, which is unable to support plant life, and figuring out a way to improve it so it can support a plant," Vazquez said. "In our project, we amended the soil with bonemeal, organic material and a small amount of healthy soil. We used different mixtures of the 'moon material' and our amendments to see which mixture would best support plant growth."
Warehime added that the group was able to create a "super amendment" that could be added to the moon mixture.
"Upon adding this mixture, we discovered the growth of our oat and clover plants increased dramatically," Warehime said. "Each time we went back into the greenhouse to check the status of our plant growth, our group had the most growth every time. Within the first week, our plants tripled in size."
The most challenging part of the project was planning the amendment mixture to ensure they could make soil that could adequately support plant life, Vazquez noted. "The best part was going to the greenhouse to analyze how well the plants were doing in the soils," he said. "It's exciting to see growth in what was unhealthy lunar regolith."
Warehime added that measuring the plant accurately was also a challenge. "My favorite part of the project was working with my group to come up with ideas of what to add to our super amendment mixture," she said. "I also enjoyed becoming closer friends with my group members since we spend more time with them."
Couradeau said she wants her students to learn about soil by experiencing soil properties and seeing how soil health impacts plant growth. "Teaching only in lecture style can be dry," she said. "Having them experiment with the material and try to turn it into something supporting plant growth is a better way to learn. It's also turned out to be really fun."
Students will wrap up the semester with a video presentation for a panel of University faculty, during which they will present their findings and field questions. The class received support from Media Commons at Penn State to prepare their video.
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