Before China launched its Chang’e 4 mission – named after the Chinese goddess of the Moon – bound for the far side of the Moon, scientists made sure to place a small tank containing plant seeds. Now, the China National Space Administration team has announced that a cotton seed has sprouted. Again China makes history.
A cotton seed has germinated on the Moon. This makes it the first otherworldly plant in human history. Astronauts aboard the International Space Station often do these tasks to study how growth changes in microgravity affect plants and seeds (and to diversify the diets of astronauts in space), and plants and seeds have orbited the Earth intermittently throughout the history of spaceflight. But the closest terrestrial vegetation has been to the Moon was in 1971, when Apollo 14 astronaut Stuart Roosa brought hundreds of tree seeds to orbit the Moon with him. Many of these seeds were later planted on Earth and became “moon trees”.
In addition to the cotton that has just germinated and that we see in the image that accompanies the article, the Chinese moon capsule also includes seeds for growing potatoes and a common laboratory plant called Arabidopsis , but none of them have sprouted so far.
Will China manage to grow a flower on the moon?
In any case, it is not strange that they are having a hard time getting ahead. Keep in mind that the seeds have been through a lot of hustle and bustle: launch drama, uncomfortable temperature swings, low gravity, and high radiation.
Airtight container
When Chang’e 4 landed on the other side of the Moon on January 3, its cargo included an airtight container with bioscience tests, including an experiment called a “micro-ecological circle of the moon’s surface.” The container is equipped with a small but powerful control system to keep the interior at around 25 degrees Celsius.
The capsule and its seeds are stored in the Chang’e 4 lander, which is located inside the Von Kármán crater , on the far side of the moon. The lander is accompanied by the Yutu 2 rover, which has left its counterpart on the ground to explore the neighborhood. Both robots are experiencing their first long, cold night on the moon, when day and night last for about two Earth weeks.
“We have considered future survival in space. Learning about the growth of these plants in a low-gravity environment would allow us to lay the foundations for our future establishment of the space base , “explains Liu Hanlong, leader of the experiment.
In this micro-ecosystem that reached the Moon, plants produced oxygen and food through photosynthesis. The container is thus completely isolated from the extremes of temperature and strong radiation on the Moon. Chinese scientists designed tubes for the container to carry natural light from Earth to the moon for plants to photosynthesize.
China is planning another mission to the Moon this year to collect rock samples from the surface and bring them back to Earth.
Image credit: Chongqing University
