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Microbes may help astronauts transform human waste into food
Human waste may one day be a valuable resource for astronauts on deep-space missions. Now, a Penn State research team has shown that it is possible to rapidly break down solid and liquid waste to grow food with a series of microbial reactors, while simultaneously minimizing pathogen growth.
"We envisioned and tested the concept of simultaneously treating astronauts' waste with microbes while producing a biomass that is edible either directly or indirectly depending on safety concerns," said Christopher House, professor of geosciences, Penn State. "It's a little strange, but the concept would be a little bit like Marmite or Vegemite where you're eating a smear of 'microbial goo.'"
[...] "Each component is quite robust and fast and breaks down waste quickly," said House. "That's why this might have potential for future space flight. It's faster than growing tomatoes or potatoes."
Today, astronauts aboard the International Space Station recycle a portion of water from urine, but the process is energy intensive, said House. Solid waste management has been a bigger hurdle. This currently is ejected into the Earth's atmosphere where it burns up.
"Imagine if someone were to fine-tune our system so that you could get 85 percent of the carbon and nitrogen back from waste into protein without having to use hydroponics or artificial light," said House. "That would be a fantastic development for deep-space travel."
Coupling of anaerobic waste treatment to produce protein- and lipid-rich bacterial biomass (DOI: 10.1016/j.lssr.2017.07.006) (DX)
(Score: 3, Funny) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Tuesday January 30 2018, @06:27AM (5 children)
I just stopped hoping I could be an astronaut someday.
Eating one's own shit might be completely cool but does it _really_ have to be like Vegemite?
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 30 2018, @07:24AM
vitameatavegamin [youtube.com]
(Score: 3, Informative) by Arik on Tuesday January 30 2018, @07:30AM
Marmite, on the other hand, is simply a crime against humanity.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 30 2018, @10:50AM
Micro-ecologies of microbes can be engineered to work together to create whole foods from waste while still in the gut. Different astronauts could be inoculated with different set of microbes so that one shits whole carrots, another whole potatoes, yet another lima beans, and so on. Then they could just pass the crock pot around every morning and let it cook until dinner. The missing 15% could be filled in with regular hydroponically produced foods or crickets or something.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday January 30 2018, @01:33PM
I've got news Soylentis, we're all astronauts, travelling on a tiny space-ship [half-earthproject.org]. Keep growing the population and eventually we'll all be eating our own waste (including the dead people) converted into a smear of microbial goo, because microbes are the only thing that can withstand the relentless pressure of humans on their habitat.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday January 30 2018, @04:47PM
Make sure it has an
appallingappealing form.It needs to work like those modern soft drink machines where you get an overly complex menu for a huge number of choices and variations of soft drinks.
The neutral color and flavor of Facebook branded poo sludge food-like substance would have artificial flavors added based on 87 flavors with 14 options and 3 variations. (Sort of like selecting which edition of Windows to install.)
I always wondered what kind of menu the star trek replicators would have if you can also replicate objects and drugs.
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