The famous director Ridley Scott and Matt Damon have truly conquered our imagination with their sci-fi film, The Martian. However, some parts of the film will soon leave the realm of imagination and into the world of reality; for according to some reports NASA and the Peru-based International Potato Centre (CIP) will plant some potatoes on Mars soon.
Of course the experiment will not yet involve a space mission towards Mars aiming to plant potato. NASA's team of experts will first cultivate potatoes in Mars-like condition found here on earth. And the said location according to reports would be on Perus' Pampas de La Joya desert. According to CIP via cnbc, "The increased levels of carbon dioxide will benefit the crop, whose yield is two to four times that of a regular grain crop under normal Earth conditions. The Martian atmosphere is near 95 percent carbon dioxide," that is why they've chosen Pampas de La Joya desert for its known similarities with Mars environment.
If the said simulation and experiment would be successful, then space farming would be the next big thing for the people on earth. The experiment is really vital for it will serve as a framework and basis for future space farming mission. Chris McKay, planetary scientist of the NASA Ames research center said via cnbc that, "The extraordinary efforts of the team have set the bar for extraterrestrial farming. The idea of growing food for human colonies in space could be a reality very soon."
Aside from purely space farming, the future space "potato" mission would also be helping widen our understanding about the improvement of global food security. "How better to learn about climate change than by growing crops on a planet that died two billion years ago? We need people to understand that if we can grow potatoes in extreme conditions like those on Mars, we can save lives on Earth," said Joel Ranck, CIP's head of communications.