Conversations That Matter

Ep 448 - Space – The Final Food Frontier Guest: Prof. Mike Dixon By Stuart McNish   Captain James T. Kirk starts “Star Trek” by saying, “Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore new worlds; to seek out new life and civilizations; to boldly go where no one has gone before!” Five years is a long time and packing five years of food would be impossible.   While the writers of the series dealt with the production of food in a variety of ways – everything from coloured cubes to a protein resequencer that could replicate certain foods and an onboard hydroponic greenhouse to grow fruits and vegetables. The reality of producing food in space is extremely complex. And if we are planning three and more years in space missions, we need to learn how to grow it on the way and on whichever plant we land.     At the University of Guelph, Professor Mike Dixon and a team of researchers have been tackling this challenge for 20 plus years, and Dixon says, “We