Ruby Hamill – Colonisation Of Outer Space
Space Colonisation!
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Ruby Hamill – Colonisation Of Outer Space
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Have you ever wondered about what it would be like to live on another planet? For example Mars, our neighbour. But have you ever thought of the challenges of actually surviving on another planet? Like food sources. Can food grow on planets other than earth? Well, this is what I've been inquiring into. I've been learning about how we can recreate the food chain on Mars and what challenges we might have to face whilst doing so. My investigation carried me into Carter Observatory and interviewing Naomi from The Rocket Lab, and an astronaut named Haritina Mogosanu. Haritina has a lot of knowledge about the Earth and Mars, the stars and everything connected with space. I found it really easy to understand and collect all of the data she gave my group, and she told us what she connected to. Haritina got chosen to go on a Mars One mission to Mars, and then I started to wonder what astronauts do about food supplies. This is what types of food astronauts eat in and on their way to space: Well, the first kind of food that astronauts ate was tubed food. It's just mushed up food in a toothpaste tube. About the consistency and texture of tomato sauce. But by the late 60's scientists invented freeze-dried food, with no liquid substances what so ever. But the only slight problem with that is that sometimes when you are eating it with a spoon it can float away, due to 0% gravity levels. Late after freeze-dried food, scientists created re-highdrated food, and because the food is wet and damp, it would stick to the spoon instead of wondering off.
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Ruby Hamill – Colonisation Of Outer Space
Astronauts couldn't eat these foods all of the time though because they need vitamins, minerals and calcium to keep they’re bodies healthy. So they tried to actually grow their own vegetables and fruits with a little garden inside the rocket. We may be able to grow plants on other planets to, but plants have needs, and unless they don’t have their needs fulfilled, they won’t grow. The funny thing was when I went to carter observatory; I got to taste astronaut ice cream, which is basically de-highdrated ice cream with no liquid substances. Like freeze-dried food. While interviewing and astronaut named Haritina Mogosanu, she encouraged me to think more deeply about growing food in outer space, and the challenges of their survival. As well as learning about plants needs and Mars’s environmental conditions. Plants need blue light, H2O, CO2, soil, air and warmth to survive. Mars is quite a cold planet. It's about -133 degrees in the winter and 27 degrees in the summer. The main reason it is cold is because the only form of H2O on Mars is ice. "Previously, NASA researchers had discovered that we would have to ship soil from Earth which would take a very long time. But a resent discovery suggests that using Mars's Martian soil might actually be a possibility. At any given location on Earth, the air pressure can vary about 10% whereas on Mars it can vary by as much as 50%. Mars' atmosphere is mostly carbon dioxide and therefore behaves differently than Earth's mostly nitrogen and oxygen atmosphere.
Mars's atmosphere is mostly made up of CO2 it will be the most likely planet to succeed in growing fruits, vegetables and plants because they breath in carbon dioxide and breath out oxygen so that we will be able to breathe. If we cannot grow food on Mars because it is to cold, we might need to use a solar powered greenhouse, similar to the one NASA is experimenting with and developing. Mars does not have H2O on its surface but scientists say that there were 5
lots of huge oceans thousands of centuries ago in something like 1200. In about 1-2 hundred, thousand years from then, all of the water dried up, so mars had no water. But scientists say that if they send a robot to drill holes in Mars, the robot will scan the hole for any signs of water underneath half of Mars's crust. The only problem is that plants need air as well. And Mars doesn't have air in its atmosphere, so we would need to use a solar powered greenhouse with some sort of air supply running through it to keep the plants healthy and growing. As a result of this food growing in space could be a problem. I also interviewed another astronaut from The Rocket Lab. Naomi was actually very knowledgeable about food technology. To prolong the life of food humans use food technology. Such as fridges, cupboards and ovens. These are all sources of food technology. But food technology can mean other things too. Sometimes it means developing food and making new recipes. There are food technologists all of the time working and experimenting with different kinds of foods to see what new recipes they can create. Back to fridges and storage areas, it is always best to use a fridge or a freezer because the cold of the frost keeps things alive like frosty grass on a cold winters day. Astronauts have fridges in their rockets to keep their food fresh. Technology such as flash pasteurisation improves the shelf life of our food while guarding it from harmful bacteria. Food technology allows us to replace the air inside the packaging of our food to preserve its natural texture, colour, and flavour. Additional antioxidants keep our food as fresh as possible for as long as possible (youtube.com). But this is the big question I need to answer. To re-create the food chain we have to have animals, and to have animals we will have to re-create their natural habitat so that they feel at home and can survive, I mean you can’t expect a monkey to live in the desert or a farm or something. But we will have to grow grass, flowers and trees to do that. We would have to transport the trees to Mars from Earth and then plant them in Mars's Martian soil. We will need at least 50 of each animal, insects, mammals, birds and reptiles so that they can start to bread. But what about all of the sea animals? What about their ocean? There is no way we can bring the ocean to another planet! We would have to bring them last after we can re-create the sea. But we can only bring the other animals if we can recreate all the biomes possible! Deserts, snow biomes, jungles, and farms. Mars is already made up of sandy soil so it will be 6 Â
Ruby Hamill – Colonisation Of Outer Space
easy to re-create the deserts. But if we where to take whales to another planet, we would have to build a rocket with a huge tank big enough so a whale can fit in it, filled with water. And that will cost a lot of money, As well as a very long time. At least 100 years. To wrap it up, growing and transporting food into space is a possibility but it will take a long time for it to become a reality. It will definitely be difficult to transport all of the food groups. But taking animals and plants to another planet will almost be possible, even though it seems like it will be impossible, we can do it. And, we will be able to do it very soon. There are also a lot of things to think about when we take the food to another planet, there is food technology and how we will keep the food alive in nine months on the way to Mars. While we are on Mars we might even make some huge discoveries to do with new food, new plants and new biomes. We might even be able to create them, let alone discover them. These are all possibilities not yet known. But what we know is that in 100 years we will be completely set up to live on Mars.
Bibliography Images https://www.google.co.nz/search?q=alien+fruit&client=safari&rls=en&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ &sa=X&ved=0CBsQsARqFQoTCMnU9MeG-scCFeXGpgodORMKDw&biw=1440&bih=763 https://www.google.co.nz/search?q=alien+fruit&client=safari&rls=en&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&v ed=0CBsQsARqFQoTCMnU9MeG-scCFeXGpgodORMKDw&biw=1440&bih=763#tbm=isch&q=rare+fruit Experts I Interviewed
Haritina Mogosanu Astronaut
Naomi Altman Engeneering systems expert from the rocket lab
W ebsites tha t whe r use ful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q1VEqko4GQ
https://www.tki.org.nz/epic2 http://www.clickview.co.nz http://spider.qmc.school.nz/spider/pages/library/librarysearch.aspx http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/k-4/home/F_Living_in_Space.html http://inhabitat.com/solar-powered-spinach-growing-greenhouse-wins-nasas-international-space-appschallenge/
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http://www.mars-one.com/faq
https://online.clickview.co.nz/mylibrary/videos/3c492a4e-bdd7-d4b0-ff57-6c49c91f188a http://www.stuff.co.nz/science/67732563/theres-water-on-mars--scientists http://www.stuff.co.nz/science/10402278/Sea-plankton-found-outside-International-Space-Station
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