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louis

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2008-03-24

Posts: 7,208

Re: Food! - Marsians=vegetarians?

Sadly, fish farming is very problematic where you don't have copious amounts of fresh water to constantly replenish the "farm". If you had to completely clean and recycle the water, it would become very resource intensive and there is the risk of diseases passing to humans.

I agree that, for the foreseeable future, plants are the way forward, with innovative foods like the Impossible Burger being made use of.
Then we also have the possibility of cultured meat from stem cells. That would seem a more sensible meat product for Mars. The technology is not quite there yet, but there's no reason to suppose it won't be in 30, 40 years' time. Of course, if your Mars pioneers really can't do without their meat then bringing it in frozen in vacuum packs - meat will last 2 to 3 years.

Every living creater has the potential to carry pathogens and parasites these days even with careful care to vacinate and given antibiotics they still can come down sick needing the entire hurds disposed of.

That's one great reason not to bring animals to Mars, at least not initially.
Besides, being vegetarian isn't all that bad noways. If your hungry for meat, you can always go cook up the Impossible Burger.
As an added benefit, it's way less wasteful to be plant based. For every 1 calorie of beef you get from a cow, you have to feed that same cow approximately 8 calories of food. Meat isn't evil, but it definitely isn't the most efficient form of food, and I doubt it will be a luxury that the future Martian people will be able to afford any time soon.

Edit: I forgot to mention fish as an exception. If aquaponics ends up being used to grow food on Mars, than the colonists will get fish to eat, since fish are an integral part of aquaponics and you may as well eat them if you've got them.

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tahanson43206

Moderator

Registered: 2018-04-27

Posts: 17,029

Re: Food! - Marsians=vegetarians?

For Louis re #201

Thank you for the caution about adequate cleaning of water for fish farming.

I think you may be missing something, and your remark here helps to allow for an opportunity to bring it out.

In a closed environment, water for sure, and (probably) everything else must be cleaned thoroughly and regularly.

Earth is a closed system taken as a whole, but it is so large we humans often think of it as open.

The Earth provides processes to thoroughly and completely clean water (and everything else) but while those processes require vast amounts of solar or nuclear energy (at the core of the Earth) we human don't pay the bill, so we don't think about it.

On Mars, we must certainly WILL be paying the bill.

You are free to place the lives of your family at risk by depending upon solar power to meet your needs, but most of the settlers (or potential settlers) I know will want to be sure they have a nice warm nuclear fission reactor at the heart of their community to keep the lights on, the air and water clean, and everyone healthy.

(th)

Last edited by tahanson43206 (2020-02-14 21:34:16)

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 28,825

Re: Food! - Marsians=vegetarians?

I have a local fish hatchery near by and the fish are used to restock rivers and lakes to which as a the deseased fish which happen are moved to other tanks further from the group which is to be used to restock with. I think the desease fish occur from contaminants in the water source and from the foods used to feed them as its just moving water from the lanks that are used with in the tank areas which are open to the surrounding environment.

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 28,825

Re: Food! - Marsians=vegetarians?

bump for wheat

SpaceNut

Administrator

From: New Hampshire

Registered: 2004-07-22

Posts: 28,825

Re: Food! - Marsians=vegetarians?

Plant-Based Doesn’t Always Mean Healthy; You may want to reconsider a plant-based diet if your motivation is health.
But other than canned or frozen, dehydrated we are going to only have meats that are in only short lived for the most part.

These dishes do look go thou

So what is so wrong with a plant based menu?

plant-based meats are often high in sodium, ultra-processed and not any healthier than the meat they imitate.

Impossible Burger, for example, is an impressive meat-free mix of soy, potato proteins, coconut and sunflower oils.

grocery stores are taking note, featuring an array of burgers, sausages, nuggets, ground meat and seafood options all without any trace of animal products.

Singapore Institute for Food and Biotechnology Innovation modelled the outcome of replacing bacon, chicken, beef burgers and ice cream with animal-free versions.

Is the issue is nutrition?

plant-based alternative were below the daily recommendations for vitamin B12, calcium, potassium, zinc and magnesium, and higher in sodium, sugar and saturated fat.

Plant-based meat alternatives lacked certain amino acids and derivatives, like creatine, taurine and anserine, “which can all have an impact on our health and potentially brain function as well as muscle function,

Mars_B4_Moon

Member

Registered: 2006-03-23

Posts: 9,175

Re: Food! - Marsians=vegetarians?

Vegan v flexitarian – which will save the planet?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/articles/veg … lexitarian

NASA Researcher Harvests Crops in Antarctica
https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/nasa … antarctica

Jess Bunchek, a plant scientist from NASA's Kennedy Space Center, harvests Mizuna mustard greens inside EDEN ISS, a greenhouse at the Neumayer III station in Antarctica, on April 28, 2021. Bunchek is spending about a year in Antarctica conducting controlled environment plant research in isolated and remote locations as part of a joint mission with the German Aerospace Center (DLR). DLR plans and implements Germany’s national space program and manages EDEN ISS. The Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), a German scientific organization with expertise in polar and marine research, operates the Antarctic Neumayer III station, where researchers can live and work year-round despite the harsh environmental conditions.

Mizuna mustard has previously grown on the International Space Station as part of several experiments in NASA’s Vegetable Production System, a plant growth chamber aboard station also known as “Veggie.” Bunchek is growing the leafy green at the EDEN ISS greenhouse in Antarctica, along with other crops that have grown on the space station or will in the future, such as peppers. Food crops grown in closed-loop environments in space will augment packaged food diets for astronauts, helping keep them healthy on long-duration missions and reducing the frequency of resupply missions required from Earth. Testing in high fidelity analogs like EDEN ISS speeds up the research.

How Japan went from being an almost entirely vegetarian country to a huge consumer of meat
https://www.businessinsider.com/how-jap … eat-2016-3
Growing livestock takes land away from more efficient plant agriculture, and already in medieval Japan, too many forests had been cleared for fields and too many draft animals were being killed for their flesh — which prompted Japan’s rulers to issue meat-eating bans.

The first such ban was announced in 675 CE and meant no beef, monkey, chicken, or dog in Japanese pots from late spring until early autumn. Later, more bans followed.

The religion elements? Medieval Japan  practically vegetarian and national religions, Buddhism and Shintoism, both promoted plant-based eating.

Veganism may not save the planet: Study suggests limited meat consumption better for environment, animals
https://phys.org/news/2023-02-veganism- … ption.html

Study hints healthier school lunch can reduce obesity
https://omaha.com/lifestyles/study-hint … 2148d.html

Obesity Linked with Changes to Expression of Alzheimer’s-Related Genes
https://www.genengnews.com/metabolic-di … ted-genes/

A new study by researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UT Health San Antonio) has linked obesity with changes in the expression of 21 Alzheimer’s disease (AD)—related genes,  and offered up a potential mechanism that may explain why Alzheimer’s is sometimes more frequent among adults who experienced obesity in midlife.

The findings, from a large sample of 5,619 participants in the Framingham Heart Study, implicated a number of genes that are known to be part of multiple pathways involved in AD neurobiology.

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2023-02-22 11:46:47)

Calliban

Member

From: Northern England, UK

Registered: 2019-08-18

Posts: 3,405

Re: Food! - Marsians=vegetarians?

In praise of potatoes.

Under UK conditions, potatoes yield 40 tonnes per hectare per year.  One kg of potatoes contains 870 calories.  By contrast, UK wheat yields are 7.2 tonnes per hectare and wheat contains 3290 calories.  So potatoes produce 50% more calories per unit land under cultivation.

Potatoes beat rice on an equal calorie basis, for most micronutrients as well.  But potatoes will yield 3x as many calories as rice per unit land under cultivation.
https://vegfaqs.com/potatoes-vs-rice/

The average person need 2250 calories per day.  If half of those calories come from potatoes, that implies an annual potatoe consumption of 472kg per capita.  This can be grown on 118 square metres or 0.03 acres.  So if you want to feed a large population cheaply, on a small cultivated area, expect to be eating a lot of potatoes, on Earth or on Mars.  Looks like Mark Watney got it about right.  Mars cuisine is going to contain a lot of potatoes.

UK population is about 67 million, which makes the country rather crowded.  Using the figures above, providing half of all calories to those people using potatoes, would need some 8000 square kilometres under cultivation.  That is 3.3% of UK land area.  Most countries could be food self sufficient I think, if they weren't so fussy about what they ate.  That includes countries that are rather crowded, like Belgium and Netherlands.  Even with population levels of 1000/km2, food self sufficiency with a potatoe dominated diet is possible.

Assuming UK productivity levels, and assuming half of calories from pitatoes, Musk's 1 million population Martian city will need 118 km2 of potatoe growing ag-domes.  That is a square roughly 11km aside.  A remarkably compact area for a city of 1 million people.  Keeping those domes at a warm 17°C on Mars, would require about 47GW of heating, assuming perfect black body radiation.  Only about half of that will come from the sun.  The domes themselves will intercept IR radiation and reradiate back to ground.  Covering the domes with insulation at night will also cut down the amount of heating needed.  But I think we will need to use some nuclear heat to provide optimal growing temperature.  Not a problem if we are producing that heat anyway.

Last edited by Calliban (2023-03-10 04:03:13)

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"Plan and prepare for every possibility, and you will never act. It is nobler to have courage as we stumble into half the things we fear than to analyse every possible obstacle and begin nothing. Great things are achieved by embracing great dangers."