NASA scientists are studying a special strategy for building bases on the Moon and Mars: growing them on site from live mushrooms.
The idea is to send the dormant fungus to the moon and, once it arrives, give it water and the necessary conditions to grow, according to a NASA press release. It would also require a supply of photosynthetic bacteria to provide the fungus with nutrients. Once the mushroom has grown into the shape of a structure, it will be heat treated, effectively killing it and turning it into a compact brick.
NASA dreams of building houses for humans on Mars, but it's not easy to pack tons of building materials and get them into space on the Red Planet. This is why the agency is interested in alternative ideas, including the possibility of 'growing houses'.
NASA's Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program funded research into the viability of myco-architecture processes that could use fungi to grow habitats on the Moon and Mars.
The concept focuses on the mycelial part of the fungus. “These tiny filaments create intricate structures with extreme precision, joining together into larger structures such as mushrooms,” NASA said in a statement Tuesday. The agency posted a video describing the idea of the habitat and showing some concept art.
The habitat concept includes a three-layer dome composed of water ice on the outside; cyanobacteria (which produce oxygen and nutrients) in the middle; and the inner layer of mycelium, which feeds and grows around the scaffold to create a home on Mars.
NASA said the structure will be “baked to kill life forms, ensuring structural integrity and preventing contamination of Mars and any microbial life that already exists.”
Researchers have already experimented with creating objects using mycelium. A team from Stanford and Brown Universities raised a completely usable stool as part of a myco-architecture project at NASA's Ames Research Center in 2018. After two weeks of growth, the stool looked like something long forgotten in the refrigerator.
This stool was grown from mycelium in a 2018 experiment. 2018 Stanford-Brown-RISD iGEM Team
The ideas behind the habitat on Mars could potentially be transferred for construction on Earth.
Research is still in very early stages, but it shows how scientists are working to expand horizons when it comes to future human habitats outside of Earth.
Sources: Photo: 2018 Stanford-Brown-RISD iGEM Team
