Astronauts eat first food grown in space

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LONDON: Last week three NASA astronauts have become the first to sample the multimillion-dollar lettuce heads. Although grown in space, they seemed like ordinary red romaine lettuce heads, yet as per a lecturer at the School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering at the University of Sydney, Dr Xiaofeng Wu, the crunchy leaves is something that may unlock the future of space travel.
Dr Xiaofeng Wu explained the International Space Station entirely depends on mother Earth for the supply of food to its crew members. This at times put the lives of the astronauts in danger.
He added, “The space-grown lettuce is the first step towards self-sufficient manned spacecrafts. This also provides feasibility for future manned space explorations, like mars missions. This makes it possible for human beings to have fresh food for space travel and space colonization”.
The International Space Station (ISS) is stocked with at least six-months worth of food. The restocking supplies are very expensive and not successful every time.
It costs around $10,000 in sending one pound (450g) of food from Earth to space. Each astronaut requires 3.8 pounds of food every day on missions that go on up to 355 days. In this scenario the bill for space food can quickly shoot up.