SEARCH · Search NASA
Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.
Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.
A stochastic domination analysis model was developed to examine the effect that emerging carbon markets can have on the spatially varying returns and risk profiles of bioenergy crops relative to conventional crops. The code is written in MATLAB, and includes the calculated output. See the README file for instructions to run the code.
This dataset contains leaf photosynthetic and biochemical traits, plant biomass, and yield in five C3 crops (chickpea, rice, snap bean, soybean, wheat) and four C4 crops (sorghum, maize, Miscanthus × giganteus, switchgrass) grown under ambient and elevated O3 concentration ([O3]) in the field at free-air O3 concentration enrichment (O3-FACE) facilities over the past 20 years.
During large-scale, outdoor algal biomass growth, production strain(s) are subject to attack by pathogens, predators, and non-productive competitors, compromising the biomass yield. The project team at UCSD developed and demonstrated the effectiveness of Volatile Organic Compound, VOC, analysis via mass spectrometry (MS) as an early detection system for the presence of production algal ponds infection. The MS detection can then trigger high-resolution melt analysis (HRMA) and enhanced quantitative PCR (qPCR) to identify predatory or pathogenic species precisely. This study gathered the foundational data informing how wholly automated systems monitor the health of production ponds. By detecting the presence of low molecular weight VOCs in the air space above ponds, the instrument was able to mimic “sniffing” the health of the algae pond. This early warning system will be free growers from time-consuming and costly regular surveillance of ponds with the current techniques, such as qPCR and flow-cam assays, which are slower, less sensitive, and not easily fully automated, resulting in increased production efficiency through the reduction of crop loss. This project demonstrated that Chemical Ionization Mass Spectrometry, CIMS, could serve as a real-time monitor of ponds health tracking up to 100 different VOCs simultaneously for continuous periods up to 60 days without interruption, signaling infection within an algal crop 24 to 36 hours prior to techniques such as qPCR and microscopy. While mass spectrometry is an expensive tool, this simple VOC sampling system proved not only to be sensitive and robust but could to multiplexed to monitor several ponds, lowering the overall cost serially. This technology demonstrated a reduction in biomass production cost by approximately 50% compared to growers not employing any detection methodology.
This dataset contains data on agricultural crop and residue production by county from 2022 to 2041. The agricultural crop in this dataset includes barley, biomass sorghum, corn, cotton, energy cane, eucalyptus, grain sorghum, hay, miscanthus, oats, pine, poplar, rice, soybean, switchgrass, wheat, and willow, and the agricultural residue includes barley straw, corn stover, oats straw, sorghum stubble, and wheat straw. The dataset was obtained from the database of the BT23 (Davis et al., 2024) for the mature-market medium scenario with biomass market prices of up to $70 per dry ton.
Bioreactor retention time is a key process variable that will influence costs that are relevant to long distance space travel or long duration space habitation. However. little is known about the effects of this parameter on the microbiological treatment options that are being proposed for Advanced Life Support (ALS) systems. Two bioreactor studies were designed to examine this variable. In the first one, six retention times ranging from 1.3 to 21.3 days--were run in duplicate, 81 working-volume continuous stirred tank reactors (CSTR) that were fed ALS wheat residues. Ash-free dry weight loss, carbon mineralization, soluble TOC reduction, changes in fiber content (cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin), bacterial numbers, and mineral recoveries were monitored. At short retention times--1.33 days--biodegradation was poor (total: 16-20%, cellulose - 12%, hemicellulose - 28%) but soluble TOC was decreased by 75-80% and recovery of major crop inorganic nutrients was adequate, except for phosphorus. A high proportion of the total bacteria (ca. 83%) was actively respiring. At the longest retention time tested, 21.3 days, biodegradation was good (total: 55-60%, cellulose ca. 70%, hemicellulose - ca. 55%) and soluble TOC was decreased by 80%. Recovery of major nutrients, except phosphorus, remained adequate. A very low proportion of total bacteria was actively respiring (ca. 16%). The second bioreactor study used potato residue to determine if even shorter retention times could be used (range 0.25-2.0 days). Although overall biodegradation deteriorated, the degradation of soluble TOC continued to be ca. 75%. We conclude that if the goal of ALS bioprocessing is maximal degradation of crop residues, including cellulose, then retention times of 10 days or longer will be needed. If the goal is to provide inorganic nutrients with the smallest volume/weight bioreactor possible, then a retention time of 1 day (or less) is sufficient.
The long-term vegetative and reproductive growth rates of a wheat crop (Triticum aestivum L.) were determined in three separate studies (24, 45, and 79 days) in response to a wide range of photosynthetic photon fluxes (PPF, 400-2080 micromoles per square meter per second; 22-150 moles per square meter per day; 16-20 hour photoperiod) in a near-optimum, controlled-environment. The CO2 concentration was elevated to 1200 micromoles per mole, and water and nutrients were supplied by liquid hydroponic culture. An unusually high plant density (2000 plants per square meter) was used to obtain high yields. Crop growth rate and grain yield reached 138 and 60 grams per square meter per day, respectively; both continued to increase up to the highest integrated daily PPF level, which was three times greater than a typical daily flux in the field. The conversion efficiency of photosynthesis (energy in biomass/energy in photosynthetic photons) was over 10% at low PPF but decreased to 7% as PPF increased. Harvest index increased from 41 to 44% as PPF increased. Yield components for primary, secondary, and tertiary culms were analyzed separately. Tillering produced up to 7000 heads per square meter at the highest PPF level. Primary and secondary culms were 10% more efficient (higher harvest index) than tertiary culms; hence cultural, environmental, or genetic changes that increase the percentage of primary and secondary culms might increase harvest index and thus grain yield. Wheat is physiologically and genetically capable of much higher productivity and photosynthetic efficiency than has been recorded in a field environment.
In this paper, we report on recent results from the Heterogeneous Agricultural Research Via Interactive, Scalable Technology (HARVIST) project. HARVIST seeks to provide the tools and scalability required to enable practicioners to analyze large, diverse data sets that may come from different data sources. We have focused on agricultural applications, and our current results demonstrate the ability of the system to train a crop type classifier that operates on orbital remote sensing images. We find that this classifier can label crops with an accuracy of 82%, comparable to other published results.
Global LAI-VI relationships are statistically significant, crop-specific, and mostly non-linear. This research enables the operationalization of large-area crop modeling and, by extension, has relevance to both fundamental and applied agroecosystem research.
As astronauts venture farther from Earth, and for longer periods, food will become increasingly critical. Crop production can supplement a packaged diet to provide additional nutrients and variety for astronauts. Testing with the Veggie chamber on the International Space Station is allowing us to understand the impacts of gravity and spaceflight on crop growth and nutritional content, and the importance of plants to astronauts living and working away from our blue home planet.
As astronauts venture farther from Earth, and for longer periods, food will become increasingly critical. Crop production can supplement a packaged diet to provide additional nutrients and variety for astronauts. Testing with the Veggie chamber on the International Space Station is allowing us to understand the impacts of gravity and spaceflight on crop growth and nutritional content, and the importance of plants to astronauts living and working away from our blue home planet.
As astronauts venture farther from Earth, and for longer periods, food will become increasingly critical. Crop production can supplement a packaged diet to provide additional nutrients and dietary variety for astronauts. Several unique challenges exist for growth of plants in microgravity and on other planetary surfaces. Testing with the Veggie chamber on the International Space Station is allowing us to understand the impacts of gravity and spaceflight on crop growth and nutritional content, and the importance of plants to astronauts living and working away from our blue home planet.
As astronauts venture farther from Earth, and for longer periods, food will become increasingly critical. Crop production can supplement a packaged diet to provide additional nutrients and dietary variety for astronauts. Several unique challenges exist for growth of plants in microgravity and on other planetary surfaces. Testing with the Veggie chamber on the International Space Station is allowing us to understand the impacts of gravity and spaceflight on crop growth and nutritional content, and the importance of plants to astronauts living and working away from our blue home planet.
As astronauts venture farther from Earth, and for longer periods, food will become increasingly critical, and crop production can provide additional nutrients and variety for astronauts. Our work on the International Space Station is allowing us to understand the impacts of gravity and spaceflight on crops, and the importance of plants to astronauts living away from our blue home planet. What we are learning in space also translates to the future of agriculture on Earth.
Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden and NASA have been partnering since 2015 to conduct a citizen science education program for middle and high school students called Growing Beyond Earth (GBE). Growing Beyond Earth is a multi-classroom science project designed to advance NASA’s research on growing plants in space. GBE was implemented locally and scaled nationally under two NASA Grants. Now serving more than 250 schools and over 10,000 middle and high school students nationwide, GBE successfully improved STEM education. It also contributed student-generated data to NASA, improving NASA research on the ground and on ISS, with two student-selected crops grown in space. GBE is unique in its focus on real scientific research, enabling student “citizen scientists” to contribute data toward NASA mission planning. Each classroom receives a Fairchild-designed plant habitat analogous to the plant growing equipment aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Fairchild and NASA scientists train teachers to conduct in-classroom GBE experiments, and students then share experimental data online with NASA. As NASA looks toward a long-term human presence beyond Earth’s orbit, there are specific science, technology, engineering, and math challenges related to food production in space. During this presentation, learn how GBE is addressing those challenges by expanding the diversity and quality of edible plants that can be grown aboard spacecraft. We will share the significant scientific and educational results that have come out of this partnership and explain how we quickly pivoted to allow students to continue to contribute during the COVID-era. Finally, we will explain how on Earth, GBE is also advancing technologies for growing plants in urban, indoor, and other resource-limited settings through the GBE Maker challenge for High School, University, and Professional communities of Makers across the country to develop the next generation of space crop production technologies. These programs are supported by NASA.
As astronauts venture farther from Earth, and for longer periods, food will become increasingly critical. Crop production can supplement a packaged diet to provide additional nutrients and dietary variety for astronauts. Several unique challenges exist for growth of plants in microgravity and on other planetary surfaces. Testing with the Veggie chamber on the International Space Station is allowing us to understand the impacts of gravity and spaceflight on crop growth and nutritional content, and the importance of plants to astronauts living and working away from our blue home planet
The History of Food and Exploration, an Overview of the History of Space Food Systems, the Vision of Space Crop Production and its Role in Exploration, an Overview of Challenges and Knowledge Gaps with Reference to Recent Flight Testing on the International Space Station, Crop Production Challenges Beyond Low Earth Orbit including the Lunar Operations, the Transit Mission to Mars and Mars Surface Operations.
The need for sustainable agricultural practices to meet the food, feed, and fuel demands of a growing global population while reducing detrimental environmental impacts has driven research in multi-faceted approaches to agricultural sustainability. Perennial cropping systems and microbial biofertilizer supplements are two emerging strategies to increase agricultural sustainability that are studied in tandem for the first time in this study. During the establishment phase of a perennial switchgrass stand in SW Montana, USA, we supplemented synthetic fertilization with a nitrogen-fixing cyanobacterial biofertilizer (CBF) and were able to maintain aboveground crop productivity in comparison to a synthetic only (urea) fertilizer treatment. Soil chemical analysis conducted at the end of the growing season revealed that late-season nitrogen availability in CBF-supplemented field plots increased relative to urea-only plots. High-throughput sequencing of bacterial/archaeal and fungal communities suggested fine-scale responses of the microbial community and sensitivity to fertilization among arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, Planctomycetes, Proteobacteria, and Actinobacteria. Given their critical role in plant productivity and soil nutrient cycling, soil microbiome monitoring is vital to understand the impacts of implementation of alternative agricultural practices on soil health.
Atmospheric soot loadings from nuclear weapon detonation would cause disruptions to the Earth’s climate, limiting terrestrial and aquatic food production. Here, we use climate, crop and fishery models to estimate the impacts arising from six scenarios of stratospheric soot injection, predicting the total food calories available in each nation post-war after stored food is consumed. In quantifying impacts away from target areas, we demonstrate that soot injections larger than 5 Tg would lead to mass food shortages, and livestock and aquatic food production would be unable to compensate for reduced crop output, in almost all countries. Adaptation measures such as food waste reduction would have limited impact on increasing available calories. We estimate more than 2 billion people could die from nuclear war between India and Pakistan, and more than 5 billion could die from a war between the United States and Russia—underlining the importance of global cooperation in preventing nuclear war.