SPACE SYSTEMS & RESEARCH

Fundamental understanding of soil and crop science is critical to improve technologies to combat the accelerating depletion of soil and nutrient resources using open-field techniques, its environmental impact including pollution of water, the worsening effects of climate change, and food insecurity in areas with increasing populations. According to the United Nations, soil-based food production will be severely constrained by 2050 at the current rate of land use. Generating 3 cm of topsoil takes 1,000 years, and if current rates of degradation continue, much of the world’s arable topsoil could be gone within 60 years. Even without this problem, human populations are concentrating in urban areas where lack of land for agriculture makes food security a big problem. Shipping food from outside urban areas is cost prohibitive, especially in economically depressed urban areas. These urban areas also tend to be along coasts that are being impacted by sea-level rise associated with climate change. Climate change is also affecting rural areas and the small farms that provide much of the local food. Additionally, field agriculture produces environmental pollution due to erosion and runoff of silt into waterways, the silt being laden with nitrogen and phosphorus (contributing to eutrophication and harmful algal bloom), herbicides and pesticides. This research seeks methodology to enhance soil health and will contribute to the political, economic, and social stability of nations by enabling food security.

All of these same problems extend with humans out into space.  From the surface of Mars to the sub-surface oceans of Europa to the poles of Titan to a deep space mining station on 16 Psyche, any human habitat in deep space must be resilient and self-sustaining to reduce supply chain costs and dependency on Earth, ensure growing system success, provide food security for the local human population, and enrich living with mental refreshment from the mind-wearying, industrial interior of work areas and wastes of the local terrain.The exploration of space promises great rewards, but also poses great challenges in food security. The limits in the shipping of food and agricultural resources from Earth and in developing natural resources space require that we develop the knowledge base for food production in space.