Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

upi.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 146 posts

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#71

Post by ars »

astrodust wrote: post #68
freeone3000 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes one BTU to heat one pound of water, one pint, one degree Fahrenheit. The units may be arbitrary, but they still line up.

Yeah, but a pound of water is not a cubic foot. A pint has nothing to do with inches.

That has nothing to do with temperature.

You can keep metric and use Fahrenheit with very little change.

And you got your units wrong anyway: "To heat one cubic centimetre of water up 1°C takes 1 Joule" - you mean 1 calorie, not 1 Joule.

Change Celsius to Fahrenheit and only calorie changes, and since it's anyway not part of SI it makes little difference.

Joule is the main energy unit, and it's not tied to Celsius at all.

I totally get the arguments for metric - except for temperature. For temperature Fahrenheit is the better scale.

Look here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_System_of_Units#...

And notice how Kelvin stands alone - it's not tied to any other unit. It can be replaced with almost no impact.

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#72

Post by abrowne »

Shorel wrote: post #9
guelo wrote: post #8

I think this article is wrong about the temperature. There is little information available but here is the original press release http://cipotato.org/press-room/blog/indicators-show-potatoes... From what I can gather they used soil from some Peruvian desert and increased the CO2 in the chamber. But there is no mention of simulating the -80F night temperatures typical on Mars.

I'm pretty sure Martians measure temperature in Celsius.

They use Kelvin.

Source: KSR's Red/Green/Blue Mars trilogy ;-)

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#73

Post by [deleted] »

tarmstrong wrote: post #45
Waterluvian wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I get in on the joke? :)

They're making a joke about the misspelling of Matt Damon. "Daemon" is a computing term [0] and /sbin/ is a folder that you might want to put a Matt Daemon in. (Also, daemons are often named with a "d" at the end, like "etcd" or "mattd".) [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daemon_(computing)

[deleted]

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#74

Post by AdamTReineke »

azernik wrote: post #34

Why exactly did this experiment require a satellite? For biological purposes Martian gravity is probably closer to Earth gravity than to microgravity, and all the other conditions could be reproduced for cheaper and at larger scale in a ground laboratory. This smells of a publicity stunt to me.

From the photo, I'm pretty sure the CubeSat is on the ground. http://nkxms1019hx1xmtstxk3k9sko.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-...

The photo is from their press release: http://cipotato.org/press-room/blog/indicators-show-potatoes...

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#75

Post by hyperpallium »

guelo wrote: post #8

I think this article is wrong about the temperature. There is little information available but here is the original press release http://cipotato.org/press-room/blog/indicators-show-potatoes... From what I can gather they used soil from some Peruvian desert and increased the CO2 in the chamber. But there is no mention of simulating the -80F night temperatures typical on Mars.

I think it's relevant to life on Mars that plants don't grow at antartic temperatures, which are:

> The highest temperature ever recorded at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station was −12.3 °C (9.9 °F) on Christmas Day, 2011, and the lowest was −82.8 °C (−117.0 °F)

Mars:

> A summer day on Mars may get up to 70 degrees F (20 degrees C) near the equator, but at night the temperature can plummet to about -100 degrees F (-73 C).

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#76

Post by clinton »

Terr_ wrote: post #67
clinton wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I ran a similar experiment at home, albeit with a fern rather than potatoes and without simulating martian light. My fern started to perish (and it was a well established plant). The biggest problem I'm facing at the moment is that Mars is extremely nitrogen deficient. https://reprage.com/post/marsarium-9 https://www.reddit.com/r/Colonizemars/comments/5vi52v/inspir...

That reminds me of an Asimov story, "Founding Father", involving ecosystem change on a planet by stranded astronauts.

Best places to find a copy these days?

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#77

Post by maxander »

AdamTReineke wrote: post #74
azernik wrote: post #34

Why exactly did this experiment require a satellite? For biological purposes Martian gravity is probably closer to Earth gravity than to microgravity, and all the other conditions could be reproduced for cheaper and at larger scale in a ground laboratory. This smells of a publicity stunt to me.

From the photo, I'm pretty sure the CubeSat is on the ground. http://nkxms1019hx1xmtstxk3k9sko.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/wp-... The photo is from their press release: http://cipotato.org/press-room/blog/indicators-show-potatoes...

Isn't a cubesat on the ground called... a box?

There's no mention of a past or future launch in the article, so this looks like an egregious case of buzzwording.

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#78

Post by protomyth »

astrodust wrote: post #50
ars wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Celsius is equally arbitrary to Fahrenheit. No, Martians measure in Nano Yocto Planck Degrees above Absolute Zero, I hereby dub that unit the Plancktigrade.

Celsius at least has a family of units that mesh with it precisely. To heat one cubic centimetre of water up 1°C takes 1 Joule. It also essentially weighs 1 gram at normal temperatures. How many BTUs does it take to heat up one cubic foot of water by one degree Fahrenheit?

If we are talking about Mars, then the colony might not like the Earth-centric origin[1] of the definition of meter, but be ok with human centric foot.

1). The original definition of meter was based on the size of the Earth.

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#80

Post by clinton »

omgam wrote: post #79
clinton wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Best places to find a copy these days?

Any central public library is fully stocked on Asimov.

It seems that this short story was originally published in an old science fiction magazine (that my local library doesn't stock). Was wondering if it also made its way into a compilation of some sort. Google hasn't turned up anything for me yet.
Post reply on HN