SpaceBio Series: Part IV
The future of agriculture
While the cost of launching payloads into space has plummeted in recent years, the cost of sending food to Mars would still be astronomical. Consequently, for long term space missions to be successful astronauts need to be fully self sufficient and make their own food. To achieve this, new methods of farming and food manufacturing must be developed to work in different strengths of gravity, maximise nutritional output, and minimise waste.
The focus of this article also forms the backbone of a wider agricultural revolution that is essential to surviving the challenges posed by climate change, growing populations, and decreasing biodiversity. If we can solve agriculture in the extremely hostile environment of space then we can apply the same techniques to increase food security and production on Earth.
So how does space affect agriculture?
Plants on Earth
It is well known that the stem of a plant grows up towards the sky and the roots grow down towards the centre of the earth. Additionally, if the plant is tipped over it adapts to its new orientation and the stem continues to grow upwards and the roots downwards. The reason for this plant behaviour is the response of the plant to light and gravity, called phototropism and gravitropism, respectively, and are controlled by growth hormones.
One such growth hormone is indoleacetic acid, which is a type of auxin and referred to as simply auxin in the following text, and stimulates growth and elongation of cells in stems, while slowing the growth of root cells. When auxin is distributed uniformly throughout a stem, all sides of the stem grow at the same rate which enables the plant to grow towards light and against gravity. If the plant is tipped over, auxin concentrates on the lower side of the stem, causing the cells on the lower side to elongate and turn the stem so it can continue to grow upwards. Similarly, auxin will concentrate on the lower sides of the roots and inhibit the elongation of root cells, causing the cells on the upper side of the root to elongate and turn the root so it can continue to grow downwards.
However, on the International Space Station (ISS) there is no sunlight and no gravitational effect due to being in free fall. So how is it possible to grow plants?
Plants in space
There are several ongoing experiments on the ISS involving plants. The main focus of this article is on NASA’s vegetable production system, called Veggie. Veggie consists of a low-power chamber that can fit six plants with each plant grown from a seed in a small, fabric “pilllow” which serves as both an anchor for the plants as well as a source of nutrients as the pillow is filled with a clay-based growth media and fertiliser. Furthermore, the pillows help distribute water, nutrients, and air to keep a healthy balance for the plant roots and prevent the roots drowning in water or engulfed by air.
To guide the direction of growth of the plant light is used from a bank of light emitting diodes (LEDs) fixed above the plants. Since plants reflect a lot of green light and absorb more red and blue wavelengths, the Veggie chamber typically glows magenta pink. Additionally, the type of light can affect plant size, nutritional content, microbial growth, taste and colour - while green light is not necessary for plant growth, it is included in plant growth systems so that the plants look similar to those grown on Earth.
Overall, experiments on the ISS showed that plants in microgravity grow well under the same light conditions as those preferred on Earth. However, there is much more optimisation that can be done. The type of soil substrate is of particular interest with one alternative to the seed pillow being a small container of water, as in the the Passive Orbital Nutrient Delivery System (PONDS). Additionally, the XROOTs experiment tested both hydroponic and aeroponic (air-based) techniques.
The question of how to optimise the growing of plants in space is discussed in the following section (1) with the startup Interstellar Labs, but farming practices are not the only food source possibility on deep space missions. Read on to find out about current companies working on using bioreactors (2) to sustainably manufacture proteins and glucose, as well as the possibility of growing meat analogues (3) in microgravity!
1. Data driven agriculture
Interstellar Labs is a French-American seed stage startup founded in 2018 by Barbara Belvisi that has raised a total of USD 11.3 M from investors such as Maxime Paradis, Auxxo, E2MC Ventures, Kima Ventures, Urania Ventures, 7percent Ventures, Starburst Accelerator, Bpifrance, Type One Ventures, and Seldor Capital. In March 2024, Interstellar Labs partnered with dsm-firmenich who are innovators in nutrition, health, and beauty to address the current industry need to provide renewable, responsibly sourced and produced ingredients and unlock the potential of exclusive natural and sustainable scent ingredients.
Interstellar Labs has achieved this by developing, manufacturing and operating advanced bio-farming platforms to produce the cleanest plant-based ingredients, combining automated farms, AI, and bioscience with a unique data-driven approach. These farms are called BioPods and are highly controlled environments consisting of an inflatable membrane, a modular aeroponics system, a hydraulic and atmospheric system, and an adaptable support frame. The aeroponics cultivation system is both adaptable and autonomous, and combines customisation and efficiency for sustainable farming with adjustable racks to optimise productivity per unit area and grow a wide variety of species.
The value of the BioPod is not just in the controlled environment that it provides in harsh conditions but also in the 50+ sensors that operate in the BioPod as these sensors allow for the study of abiotic (e.g. water, soil and atmosphere) and biotic (e.g. living organisms, such as fungi, bacteria, viruses, nematodes, and insects) stresses on plant yield, phenotype, physiology, phytochemistry and production of secondary metabolites. These responses are then analysed by AI to generate recipes that will enhance the production of targeted metabolites and accelerate plant growth with adjustments being made in real-time.
With the first 1:1 BioPod completed in September 2022 and now being tested for Earth applications, Interstellar Labs also have an extensive space programme:
Low Earth Orbit
Bloom (2025) - a payload for the ISS to study plant growth in microgravity, in collaboration with Inrae and the European Space Agency.
Nucleus (2026) - a closed loop food production system (microgreens, vegetables, mushrooms, and insects) for long term space missions.
The Moon
Little Prince (2026) - growing flowers on the moon in a transparent controlled environment, in collaboration with Astrolab.
Moonpod (2028) - an inflatable automated lunar greenhouse for the Artemis program.
Mars
Ebios (2030) - standing for Experimental Bio-Regenerative stations, Ebios is the development of a pod system constructed from several controlled environment modules adapted to the Martian environment for supporting long term missions.
2. Bioreactors
Solar Foods is a Finnish sustainable foods startup founded in 2017 and have raised a total of USD 57.7 M with their Series B finishing in November 2023 and lead investors Springvest, Agronomics, Finnish Climate Fund, Business Finland, Fazer, and Lifeline Ventures. Solar Foods are producing single-cell proteins from air (CO2, nitrogen, and water) and electricity that are not dependent on agriculture, weather or the climate and have an unlimited number of protein options. Simply put, Solar Foods use electricity to break water into oxygen and hydrogen and use the hydrogen, as well as atmospheric CO2 and mineral nutrients, to feed microorganisms that will produce a dry protein powder.
Solar Foods have commercialised this approach with their protein, Solein. Solein is 65-70 % protein, 5-8 % fat (primarily unsaturated fats), 10-15 % dietary fibres and 3-5 % mineral nutrients. The macronutrient composition of the cells is very similar to that of dried soy or algae. Solein provides iron, fibre and B vitamins, and contains all nine essential amino acids.
The video below summarises the manufacturing process and a more detailed recipe can be found here.
Solein received its first novel food regulatory approval in September 2022 from the Singapore Food Agency which approves the import, manufacture and sale of food products containing Solein in Singapore. In January 2024, Solar Foods partnered with Fazer to produce a new, limited edition snack bar to be sold in Singapore made of 70% dark chocolate, hazelnut, dried strawberries and crunchy oat puffs and 2% of Solein.
The company’s roadmap indicates they are close to completing Factory 01, their first commercial-scale facility, and will begin operations in 2024 producing 160 tonnes of Solein per year. This increase in production in anticipation of a European launch in 2025-2026 where they have filed for regulatory approval alongside the UK and US.
Solar Foods see space as the ultimate stress test for their bioprocess and by achieving production in space they hope to solve two problems: (1) to develop a secure food supply for long term space missions, and (2) improve food resilience on Earth, such as in remote villages, disaster zones or military defence situations.
Cemvita is a startup founded in 2017 in Houston, Texas (USA) by brother-sister co-founding duo Moji Karimi (CEO) and Dr Tara Karimi (CSO) who engineer microorganisms that mimic photosynthesis to convert CO2 into useful products (e.g. chemicals and polymers). Specifically, they are developing a bioreactor that mimics the plant process of photosynthesis - the conversion of CO2, sunlight and water to make glucose. By harnessing the 1 kg of CO2 that astronauts breath out per day and the atmosphere on Mars consisting of 96 % CO2 there is a sustainable source of CO2 for deep space missions and can form part of a regenerative life support system, one of NASA’s USD 1 M challenges.
While Cemvita is focussed on sustainable deep space exploration, they have a well established terrestrial market in using microbes to lower carbon emissions, having raised their Series A in 2021 led by 8090 Partners and other key investors: Energy Capital Ventures, Greentown Labs, BloombergNEF, Oxy Low Carbon Ventures.
Notably, in March 2022 Cemvita signed a USD 5 M agreement with United Airlines to commercialise the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), an alternative to jet fuel which uses non-petroleum feedstock with lower lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions, intended to be developed through a revolutionary new process using carbon dioxide (CO2) and synthetic microbes. In September of last year Cemvita agreed to supply United Airlines up to 50 million gallons of SAF made from CO2 annually for 20 years.
Additionally, in October 2023, Endolith, a subsidiary of Cemvita was awarded a grant of USD 1.1 M from the Department of Energy to harness microbes for sustainable mining.
3. Meat analogues
Aleph Farms is an Israel-based food technology company founded in 2017 that is designing new ways to grow quality animal products that improve sustainability, food security and animal welfare. Having raised their USD 105 M Series B in 2021, the company is responsible for the world’s first cultivated thin-cut steak (2018), the world’s first cultivated ribeye steak (2021), and cultivated collagen (2022). Under its product brand, Aleph Cuts, the company will launch its first product, the Petit Steak, grown from the non-modified cells of a premium Angus cow. The company is also working on producing slaughter-free collagen, a key ingredient in many food, cosmetics, and medical products. Israel approved Aleph Farm meat products for commercialisation in 2024.
Aleph Farms have completed two space missions on the ISS as part of their space program, Aleph Zero. The first was in September 2019 where they produced the first cultivated meat in space by assembling cultivated meat tissue using 3D bioprinting technology with their partner, 3D Bioprinting Solutions. The second was in April 2022 where they examined the effects of reduced gravity on the growth and maturation of cow cells, to build muscle tissue for cultivated steaks.
Extraterrestrial agriculture
Having discussed the challenges of farming in space, as well as some of the innovative startups who are attempting to solve the food supply issues on deep space missions, we at Next Sequence wanted to conclude this article with a short perspective on the long term vision of space exploration - living and farming on other planets. Here the Moon and Mars are discussed as options for humanity’s next steps which would potentially unlock new scientific research, resource extraction, and even provide a backup for humanity in case of catastrophe on Earth.
The case for the Moon
Firstly, the moon, due to its proximity to Earth, can be re-supplied with materials in matter of days and a base on the near side of the Moon would be in constant contact with the Earth, enabling communications speeds of just 1.25 seconds. Additionally, although the Moon does not have its own magnetic field it is shielded from solar radiation by the Earth’s magnetic field. Solar power is also highly efficient on the Moon as there is no atmosphere or cloud cover to reduce the incident radiation from the sun.
Most relevant for agricultural practices however, is that the lunar regolith, the dusty outer layer of soil on the Moon, is highly similar in composition to the Earth’s crust, and could therefore serve as the perfect substrate for agriculture. Paired with the frozen water from the permanently shadowed craters on the Moon, there are the beginnings of a sustainable farm. Indeed, when researchers tested lunar soil for growing marigolds they found that once bacteria were added the resulting plants were entirely healthy. Further research is ongoing.
The case for Mars
The first major challenge Mars faces is the greater distance which increases journey time for payloads and communications from days to months and seconds to several minutes, respectively. As Mars is also further from the sun and subject to mass sandstorms, solar panels also become much less efficient. Additionally, Mars has no protective magnetic field nor a nearby planet to act as protector which means that inhabitants will either have to go underground in lava tubes or bring radiation protection with them.
Mars does, however, have some advantages over the Moon, namely (1) Mars contains large quantities of solid and gaseous water, (2) Mars is larger and has a greater gravitational force than the Moon, and (3) Mars has an atmosphere abundant in carbon dioxide. Unfortunately, the soil on Mars is significantly different from that on Earth and although rich in iron, which could allow leafy green vegetables to thrive, it also contains perchlorates (salts containing chlorine and oxygen) which are harmful for humans when consumed in high concentrations. Overall, inhabiting Mars poses a significant technical challenge.
Outlook
While studies have shown that plants can grow in simulants of both lunar and Martian soil, which can be further optimised by progress in AI, there are still the practical problems of getting the astronauts to the Moon and Mars and keeping them alive there. Between the Moon and Mars, colonising the Moon is the most achievable goal and could act as both a testing ground and transport hub for future interplanetary travel. Until farming is operational astronauts could benefit from bioreactors and meat analogues.
Having now discussed the origins of space investment, the science of gravity, health tech, food solutions, and the next steps for interplanetary life we have established the foundation of the life science space economy - but that is not all! In the next article we will complete this series by discussing possibly the biggest microgravity opportunity to date, the development of the next generation of medicine.