Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

tahanson43206 · 2023-10-30 08:03:42

This topic is offered for NewMars members who might wish to provide links and comments about methods of producing useful products using methods that do not fall neatly into "horizontal farming" or "vertical farming"

The forum archive already contains a number of posts about such methods.

The first that comes to (my) mind is RobertDyck's concept of bags of chloroplasts, which can (apparently) make useful molecules with nothing but sunlight and a liquid environment containing precursor molecules.

Louis wrote about other ways of making useful molecules with biological processes.

In addition, there are posts about purely chemical processes that make useful molecules that can support human life on Mars.

I would like this topic to have value to an investor planning a facility on Mars. The market potential for a system that works in a volume that is compact would appear to be greater when the cost of creating the space needed is taken into account.

Those who would imagine fields of greenhouses on Mars will need to pay for whatever structures are needed.

Likewise, those would would imagine vertical towers full of plant trays illuminated by lighting systems will need to pay for the volume they occupy.

The investor who pursues ** this ** topic will make the minimum investment in volume for the facility, since it will be as compact as physics will allow.

On the other hand, the variety of products that are likely may be restricted, but it is likely the need for precursor chemicals/molecules will be substantial and constantly growing, so the (hypothetical) investor can be confident of a growing market for as long as Mars has a population that is itself growing.

The ability to export precursor chemicals to human populations at locations elsewhere in the Solar System ** should ** provide a growing market, even if the population of Mars grows slowly.

(th)

SpaceNut · 2023-10-30 18:01:03

There is a chloroplast topic that involves its use for respiration atmospheric clean, but it was found to be lower in ability.

Its one of those which can use both to achieve volume for production.

New Algae based Bioreactor Harnesses To absorb Carbon Dioxide- more details inside

http://growing-algae.com/how-to-grow-algae-at-home/

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-10-31 06:19:36

Some topics and news found after looking at old threads

Ocean on Land Technology’s Algae In-a-Box is a modular, moveable system that works in varied environments, allowing simultaneous growth of multiple algal species
https://www.globalseafood.org/advocate/ … roduction/

NASA shows off new algae farming technique for making biofuel
https://phys.org/news/2012-04-nasa-alga … ofuel.html

Photobioreactor design for microalgae culture
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a … 2189000025

Aquaponics
https://gogreenaquaponics.com/blogs/new … ners-guide
Sustainability, High Yield, Fresh, Nutritious Produce, Water Conservation, educed Chemical Usage, Year-Round Gardening, Space Efficiency, Cost Savings, Sustainable Food Production

Farm robots are the future
https://phys.org/news/2021-07-farm-robots-future.html

RobertDyck · 2023-10-31 14:33:25

I never gave up on chloroplasts for life support. Instill believe it's the way for a spaceship. Robert Zubrin doesn't like it. He pointed out chloroplasts are only 4% energy efficient, and corn is 0.1% efficient. He wants something at least 10% efficient at converting sunlight into food. However, I want to concentrate CO2 in bags of chloroplasts. This will greatly reduce and hopefully eliminate photorespiration. That happens when O2 binds to RuBP instead of CO2. The waste product must be recycled. That wastes energy, and all plants must do it. Photophosporilation aka the light reaction of photosynthesis is extremely efficient. It amazing, incorporating what is really nanomachines. However, the Calvin-Benson Cycle is not. It's obviously optimized for an atmosphere with much more CO2.

Chloroplast life support generates oxygen using sunlight directly. Current system on ISS must use photovoltaic panels to convert sunlight to electricity. Then DC power is converted to AC at the voltage and frequency that ISS uses. Then it must be converted back into DC to be used for electrolysis of water. That generates O2 and H2. A Sabatier Reactor combined all H2 and half of the CO2 extracted from cabin air to make methane and water. The water is recycled, but methane dumped in space. The Sabatier Reactor must be heated very hot to work. Once running the Sabatier Reactor generates heat so doesn't need more power to sustain temperature, but an electric heater is necessary to get it started. And an air conditioner must dump all that heat. Now compare that to chloroplasts.

And chloroplasts produce starch as a byproduct, not methane. So food as a byproduct. I think it is efficient.

RobertDyck · 2023-10-31 14:36:30

Biologists have asked why not use a whole living thing? But algae requires more nutrients. If you use processed human feces as the nutrient source, the resulting algae is mixed with shit. Do you want to eat shit? Literally!

Invitro hloroplasts use just water and CO2. Two ingredients available anyway on a spacecraft. And those ingredients are food safe.

Calliban · 2023-10-31 16:23:17

Chloroplasts would be useful if we had a way of manufacturing them. Is that at all possible? If they have to be carefully extracted from living plant cells, the idea is less attractive. Especially if oxidation rapidly destroys them. Eventually, we may have self replicating nanomachines that can do this sort of thing for us. But I don't think we are quite there yet.

Human shit could be turned into soil that can be used to grow actual plants. Urine might be a better source of nutrients for micro organisms. Using ion exchange membranes, dissolved salts can be removed, whilst larger protein and organic contaminants do not pass.

Another option is to put human waste into a pressure vessel containing hot water and dissolved oxygen at 300°C. All organic materials will oxidise, leaving only inorganic salts. This is quite energy intensive and unfortunately, it also destroys urea, which is a useful source of fixed nitrogen. But it would turn human waste into a sterile liquid nutrient feed that can be injected into algae panels along with CO2 and dissolved nitrates. Although the cold of Mars is problematic, its atmosphere provides a concentrated source of CO2 that can be compressed and injected into algae farming panels without any concern for bacterial contamination. In some ways, this does make it easier than it would be on Earth.

Last edited by Calliban (2023-10-31 16:31:41)

SpaceNut · 2023-10-31 18:25:28

original chloroplast topic is here

RobertDyck · 2023-10-31 18:33:57

Years ago I asked a professor of biology at my alma mater if it's possible to extract/isolate chloroplasts from leaves of a plant. She said it's a standard undergraduate laboratory exercise. She gave me printed lab procedures using a couple different procedures. Basically: plant a pea seed, and grow to 2 weeks after germination. Harvest leaves. Cut leaves with scissors into small pieces. Grind with a mortar and passel. Dissolve in a particular solvent, and centrifuge using a particular material as a filter. A few more steps but you get the idea.

The purpose of the exercise is to prove chloroplasts perform photosynthesis. The issue with this procedure is in-vitro chloroplasts only remain viable for 20 minutes. I said you could do it in a glove box filled with CO2. This would protect chloroplasts from oxygen. But the issue is photorespiration. RuBP normally binds with CO2 and splits to form 2 molecules of 3PG. When it binds with O2 it forms one molecule of 3PG and one of 2PG. The 2PG must be recycled. The process involves steps done in the chloroplast, some in a peroxisome, some in a mitochondrion. An isolated chloroplast can't recycle, so RuBP will run out. My solution is to add genes from cyanobacteria. A chloroplast has a ring of DNA called a plasmid. One chromosome in the plant is a copy of that plasmid. When a plant cell needs a chloroplast, it copies the entire chromosome in messenger RNA (mRNA). That mRNA is taken out of the nucleus. The mRNA is then transcribed back into DNA, then the ends of this new strand of DNA are connected together. This forms the plasmid for a chloroplast. The rest of the chloroplast forms around it. Analysis shows DNA for a chloroplast still has 85% of the genes of cynaobacteria. And chloroplasts still have behaviour features of cyanobacteria. Chloroplasts cannot self-replicate because they're missing certain key genes; they've become dependant on the host eukaryotic cell. Basically eukaryotes have enslaved cyanobacteria. My idea is to take the missing genes for the recycling pathway for 2PG, and put them back into the chromosome in a plant cell that forms the plasmid for chloroplasts. Actually, multi-cellular plants only have one pathway to recycle 2PG, but cyanobacteria have 3. The third is to break 2PG down into CO2. Add all pathways back. Since a pea is the easiest plant from which to harvest chloroplasts, do this to a pea plant.

Multi-cellular plants use the Glycerate pathway. Cyanobacteria does this too, but also has teh C2 cycle, and Decarboylation:

Primary-C-and-N-metabolism-of-cyanobacteria-Metabolites-highlighted-by-circles-were.png

Calliban · 2023-11-01 06:59:12

I think there is a lot riding on the success of initiatives like this. The most productive land-based staple crop in terms of calories per acre is the potato. Washington state achieves the world's best sustained yields at 70t/hectare. To grow enough calories for 1 person at these yields, would need some 120m2 of crops, i.e a 10 x 12m plot. These need to be grown in pressurised, heated greenhouses on Mars. Whilst it is possible to do this, it doesn't really hold promise for cheap food. A rapidly growing economy isn't compatible with colonists having to spend most of their daily wages on food. Chloroplasts can produce sugar by circulating them through thin plastic panels on the Martian surface. The CO2 feedstock is all around them and can be compressed and dissolved into feed water.

At Mars distance from the sun, a square metre of equatorial land recieves a peak insolation of 560W/m2. Over a day, that comes to 1.6MJ/m2. The average human needs 10MJ of food energy per day. So to meet basic calorie needs using 4% efficient chloroplasts, we need 15.5m2 of panels per person. Some 15.5m2 of thin plastic panels are going to be much cheaper than 120m2 of pressurised, heated growing space. Of course, we cannot just feed people sugar water and expect them to live long and productive lives. But sugars produced in this way can serve as feedstocks for more nutritionally balanced foods.

Will extracted chloroplasts survive a long trip from Earth? How much, in terms of mass, do we need to import to cover the calorie needs of a person for a year, given the expected half-life of chloroplasts in plastic bags?

Last edited by Calliban (2023-11-01 07:14:50)

SpaceNut · 2023-11-01 20:31:27

Potato topic is here

It is possible to grow them across all the seasons since its going to be within an enclosure. Timing each patch of them is what is critical to having enough at a constant level.

tahanson43206 · 2024-03-09 19:14:06

This post is about chloroplasts ... RobertDyck has posted frequently and in depth about chloroplasts ...

Today's NSS North Houston meeting included presentations by student competitors at a recent science fair in Houston. These were older students for the most part, so the presentations were all of good to excellent quality.

The one I'd like to highlight in this post was about creating artificial leaves by removing chloroplasts from living plants and installing them in an artificial frame.

The project involved a ** lot ** of work by the student ... it seems to me only a tiny number of humans would have the patience required.

The resulting leaves were able to take in CO2 directly and release O2. Their performance was superior to natural leaves, and they had other advantages. The challenge for the young experimenter was to find a way to extend the lives of the artificial leaves. As things stand, they only lasted about 10 days.

I am hoping the recording of the meeting will be uploaded to YouTube, but that depends upon whether the chapter President has time. he is working full time at NASA as an ISS controller after two years of training.

(th)

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#1 2023-10-30 08:03:42

Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#2 2023-10-30 18:01:03

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#3 2023-10-31 06:19:36

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#4 2023-10-31 14:33:25

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#5 2023-10-31 14:36:30

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#6 2023-10-31 16:23:17

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#7 2023-10-31 18:25:28

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#8 2023-10-31 18:33:57

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#9 2023-11-01 06:59:12

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

#10 2023-11-01 20:31:27

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#11 2024-03-09 19:14:06

Re: Farming ... neither horizontal nor vertical - chloroplasts in bags etc

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