THE OPTIMIZATION OF ROOT ZONE SUBSTRATES FOR REDUCED GRAVITY EXPERIMENTS PROGRAM
(ORZS)
Research Area: Plant Biology
Expedition(s): 14- 16 and 18
Principal Investigator(s): ● Gail E. Bingham, PhD, Utah State University, North Logan,
Utah
RESEARCH OBJECTIVES
ORZS was developed to provide direct measurements and models for plant rooting media that
cab be used in future Advanced Life Support (ALS) plant growth experiments. The goal of this
investigation is to develop and optimize hardware and procedures to allow optimal plant
growth to occur in microgravity.
EARTH BENEFITS
As less fertile land becomes available to grow
food, alternative agricultural systems that
efficiently produce greater quantities of high-
quality crops are increasingly important. Data
from the operation of the ORZS can advance
greenhouse and controlled-environment
agricultural systems and help farmers produce
better, healthier crops in a small space using
the optimum amount of nutrients.SPACE BENEFITS
The experiment develops and optimizes
hardware and procedures to allow optimal
plant growth to occur in microgravity to
support long-term spaceflight life-support
scenarios assuming the use of regenerating
green plants to provide food supplies for
crewmembers, as well as to recycle waste
products.RESULTS
The present use of particulate plant growth
media lags far behind the technological ability
to engineer a porous medium for specific
applications in a microgravity environment.
Each gravity environment presents slightly
different challenges with respect to water control and designing particular aspects of an
optimal porous medium for plant growth. Capillarity, the ability of a liquid to flow through a
narrow passage, is countered by the gravitational force (drainage), which prescribe the water
ISS016E027955 – Astronaut Peggy Whitson,
Expedition 16 commander, checks the progress of
plants growing in the Russian Lada greenhouse in
the Zvezda Service Module of the International
Space Station.