Astronauts grew green chile on the space station and made themselves space tacos [npr.org]
Astronauts aboard the International Space Station had the pleasure of dining on space tacos last weekend: tacos topped with green chile that was actually grown in space. As part of NASA's Plant Habitat-04 investigation, scientists began growing hatch chile — a type of pepper found in New Mexico's Hatch Valley — aboard the ISS in July in an effort to understand more about "plant-microbe interactions" in space, NASA said.
Astronauts have grown other crops, such as lettuce and radishes, in space before. But peppers are more difficult to grow in space because they take a relatively long time to germinate and bear fruit, according to the NASA release.
This is the first time NASA has grown peppers in space, and astronauts finally got to taste the fruits of their labor on Friday before collecting data on the red and green peppers that were harvested.
Should you collect data on peppers before you taste them?