Scientists Sprout First-Ever Seedlings in Apollo Moon Dirt

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June 02, 2022

Dear Reader, Our lead story this week discusses the successful first-ever attempt to grow plants in lunar soil. Although certainly impressive, this milestone achievement also highlights the difficulty of extraterrestrial agriculture, since the sprouts from Apollo-era moon dirt didn't exactly thrive. Elsewhere, we have stories on detecting nutrient deficiencies from space, new science-inspired music and the rising threat of satellite swarms to astronomy. Enjoy!

Lee Billings, Senior Editor, Space & Physics @LeeBillings

Extraterrestrial Life Scientists Sprout First-Ever Seedlings in Apollo Moon Dirt We now know that plants survive but fail to thrive in lunar soil By Joanna Thompson

Space Exploration 'Unsustainable': How Satellite Swarms Pose a Rising Threat to Astronomy SpaceX and other companies are still struggling to make their satellites darker in the night sky By Alexandra Witze,Nature magazine

Computing The Weather Myth: Lost Women of Science Podcast, Season 2, Bonus Episode When we first started researching Klára Dán von Neumann, we thought she was "the computer scientist you should thank for your smartphone's weather app." It turns out that's not true By Katie Hafner,The Lost Women of Science Initiative

Arts This New Album Makes Beautiful Music out of Gravity, the Elements and Photosynthesis The British band the Sound of Science elevates edutainment on its debut By Ryan Reid

Artificial Intelligence AI Can Predict Potential Nutrient Deficiencies from Space New work maps a region's nutrient landscape By Rachel Berkowitz

Scientific American Space & Physics, Volume 5, Issue 3

Politics To Prevent Nuclear Annihilation, Resume Negotiations Immediately The war in Ukraine shows the urgency of nuclear arms control By The Editors

FROM THE STORE Extraterrestrials and the Search for Life Do aliens exist? The enduring mystery of whether we're alone in the universe is a question that continues to drive scientific study into groundbreaking directions. This collection examines the latest thinking in the search for life, from discussing why we haven't found evidence of aliens so far to determining where and how to conduct the search to opening up the possibilities for what otherworldly life could truly look like.

QUOTE OF THE DAY "Most of us are not going to go to space. But if we can engineer a way to produce these kinds of crops in such an unforgiving environment--like the lunar surface--we can apply that to meet our food challenges in areas that just can't grow food anymore." Gil Cauthorn, astrobotanist

FROM THE ARCHIVE When Earth and the Moon Were One An entirely new class of astronomical object—a synestia—may be the key to solving the lingering mysteries of lunar origin By Simon J. Lock,Sarah T. Stewart | July 2019

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