Vegetation on lunar soil? Scientists grow healthy plants with the help of bacteria

In a new study published in the scientific journal Communications Biology, a team of researchers from the China Agricultural University (CAU) say: person who succeeded in growing healthy plants in lunar soil using a new cultivation technique. According to the article, they planted a benthamiana plant (Nicotiana benthamiana) in a type of lunar soil simulator with the help of three types of bacteria.

As the researchers explain in the paper, plants in the lunar soil simulator grew with good roots, healthy stems and leaves. Unfortunately, this does not mean that we can start planting on the Moon from tomorrow because lunar soil is considered barren; It does not provide any moisture or organic matter to aid plant growth.

The United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) states: The Moon’s soil consists of small fragmented rocks, dust, and fragments of meteorites, asteroids, and other space objects. In other words, it is not like the soil on Earth. In fact, experts explain that this soil is so infertile that it is impossible to do agriculture even in a terrestrial environment.

The term “lunar soil” can be misleading, as “lunar soil” has little in common with terrestrial soils. It contains no organic matter and is formed strictly by crumbling meteoroid mechanics and interaction, not by biological or chemical processes like terrestrial soils. with the solar wind and other energetic particles,” Sarah Noble, a scientist in NASA’s planetary science division, said in another study on the subject.

Plants Growing in Lunar Soil

Chinese scientists achieved this feat with a new method, using three strains of bacteria to increase the level of soluble phosphorus in samples that ‘mimicked’ the lunar soil collected on the Apollo 14 mission. The bacteria used were: Pseudomonas fluorescens, Bacillus megaterium and Bacillus mucilaginosus — mixing samples with live and dead bacteria. They tried.

In the test performed with live bacteria, Bacterial activity provided a more acidic soil and released more phosphorus, making it easier for the plant to access used nutrients.. Thus, they were able to grow healthy plants with approximately 104% higher chlorophyll concentration than in the second test. The research is considered an important step in the development of cultivation techniques in lunar soil.

“Our study shows that B. mucilaginosus, B. megaterium, and P. fluorescens can tolerate the conditions of the lunar regolith simulant and effectively sequester insoluble inorganic phosphorus within the mimetic, increasing the efficiency of the mimetic, making it a good cultivation substrate,” the researchers wrote in the study. They define it as “higher plants”.

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