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First green leaf on moon dies as temperatures plummet
The appearance of a single green leaf hinted at a future in which astronauts would grow their own food in space, potentially setting up residence at outposts on the moon or other planets. Now, barely after it had sprouted, the cotton plant onboard China’s lunar rover has died.
The plant relied on sunlight at the moon’s surface, but as night arrived at the lunar far side and temperatures plunged as low as -170C, its short life came to an end.
Prof Xie Gengxin of Chongqing University, who led the design of the experiment, said its short lifespan had been anticipated. “Life in the canister would not survive the lunar night,” Xie said.
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First Green Leaf on Moon Dies as Temperatures Plummet
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Nadia Comaneci, simple perfection.
-- '76 Olympics
(Score: 3, Insightful) by acid andy on Friday January 18 2019, @03:08PM (12 children)
PR stunt. What a wasted opportunity to do something genuinely exciting. A vacuum seal on the biosphere with some kind of minimal heat pump / temperature regulation device is probably all that was needed to give this a fighting chance but it was obviously never about science.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Immerman on Friday January 18 2019, @03:59PM (10 children)
Are you sure? I seem to recall that germination is typically the portion of the life cycle that has the worst problems with microgravity - that it proceeded without obvious trouble on the moon suggests that growing plants there won't be a major problem.
Meanwhile, nighttime temperatures on the moon plunge to -170C. It'd take a LOT of insulation or heating to withstand that for two weeks.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by acid andy on Friday January 18 2019, @04:16PM (9 children)
Well a vacuum layer provides perfect insulation, if it's a perfect vacuum, but you already knew that. That's a good point about testing the germination under lunar gravity, but they didn't need those poor silkworms for that part of the experiment.
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Friday January 18 2019, @05:35PM (2 children)
A vacuum does provide excellent insulation, but the experiment is bolted to the rest of the lander. It transfers heat by conduction to the rover and the moon's surface while radiating heat out as a function of its surface area and the fourth power of its temperature.
The moon's long (14-day) night and massive day/night temperature swings are hard problems for spacecraft and habitat design.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday January 18 2019, @07:10PM (1 child)
Append "if the habitat is built on the surface". I suspect a foot underground the variation is a lot less. I'm rather certain that 2 feet (or 2/3 meter) underground it's a lot less. And the suggested locations are lava tubes, which are a lot deeper than that.
If you were just talking about "for this experiment" then you'd have a really valid point. If you're talking about habitats and spacecraft in general, then you need to re-think things. But you may have just been talking about "for this experiment". I wouldn't have called that chamber for growing seeds and silkworms a habitat, but perhaps you would.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Saturday January 19 2019, @08:17PM
Yep. The thermal mass (and radiation protection) of living underground will help a lot. The same applies for Mars too. I'm excited to see what the geology probe on the insight lander returns about the temperature gradient there.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Immerman on Friday January 18 2019, @06:44PM
Umm, no. A vacuum layer only offers perfect insulation against conduction and convection - it does nothing whatsoever against radiation (which, for reference, is the *only* benefit of a "space blanket" over an ordinary sheet of plastic). Now, you could build a radiant barrier as well, but that's added weight and cost - and every gram spent on one thing is a gram not spent on another.
Not to say I wouldn't have liked to see it done just to be more thorough, but I wasn't the one deciding on the priorities for the available budget.
(Score: -1, Redundant) by fakefuck39 on Saturday January 19 2019, @06:21AM (4 children)
of course he knew it. the one who seems to have failed 8th grade science class here is you. I'll give you a hint, since you're a complete idiot: light travels through vacuum.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @04:13PM (3 children)
Sooo much anger. You probably didn't get laid.
(Score: 0) by fakefuck39 on Saturday January 19 2019, @09:01PM (2 children)
yes, follow mommy's advice and keep telling yourself that people making fun of you are just angry. I'm sure what got you through being picked on in high school will work in your adult life. anything that keeps you from going outside.
here's a hint - the people laughing at you are laughing because you're a clown who suggested vacuum will insulate against heat loss in vacuum. i'll let you think about that some more - it appears a day wasn't enough to churn that clown brain.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 19 2019, @09:35PM (1 child)
Not just angry. You also can't get laid. But then reading comprehension never was your strong point. What is your strong point?
(Score: -1) by fakefuck39 on Saturday January 19 2019, @11:35PM
fucking real good, according to my wife. funny how you seem to talk about other people having sex a lot, and are an expert on how a thermos works. ever stick your dick in one?
I'm just happy you are giving me more and more opportunities to point out you think a vacuum-based seal, put in the vacuum of space, will preserve heat. You can keep making up fun stories about how my wife and I don't fuck, I can just keep pointing out what you wrote. Please do keep replying.
(Score: 3, Informative) by SomeGuy on Friday January 18 2019, @04:55PM
People seem to be very hung up on the short duration and small scope of this experiment.
That is how science works sometimes.
The goal was certainly to learn something very specific (TFA does not say what) that would only occur in the short time frame. Whatever was learned may not even be directly linked to "growing food on the moon" but could have some other potential application. For all we know, the experiment may not even have much to do with growing plants, but rather learning something specific about solar radiation or low gravity.
Further, the precise nature, conditions, and devices required for any similar future experiments may hinge largely on some minor detail result of this experiment. Sometimes you have to complete small step A before you can make a meaningful larger step B.