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Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

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Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#51

Post by freeone3000 »

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?

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.

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#52

Post by clinton »

david-given wrote: post #11

From the article: "The box mimics the day-night patterns of Mars, as well as its temperature, air pressure and atmospheric composition." Wait, really? They're growing plants in what's practically a vacuum and at subzero temperatures? Really? That seems... stupendously unlikely... to me. Not that I wouldn't love to be wrong, mind. Anyone have a link to actual data? Everything linked to is just press fluff. Update: Act…

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...

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#54

Post by startupdiscuss »

enraged_camel wrote: post #26
komali2 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I definitely read an article after that movie came out about confused moviegoers that thought it was based on a true story.

On one end of the spectrum, you have people who doubt that we landed a man on the Moon. On the other end, you have people who think we had a man grow potatoes on Mars. What a time to be alive.

I bet you anything that there is some (however tiny) overlap between the two populations.

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#56

Post by jazzyb »

startupdiscuss wrote: post #54
enraged_camel wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On one end of the spectrum, you have people who doubt that we landed a man on the Moon. On the other end, you have people who think we had a man grow potatoes on Mars. What a time to be alive.

I bet you anything that there is some (however tiny) overlap between the two populations.

Relevant Mitchell and Webb Look: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6MOnehCOUw

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#57

Post by kbenson »

ars wrote: post #37
Shorel wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure Martians measure temperature in Celsius.

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

I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be pirate and/or ninja related[1], so you're missing a great opportunity to name it pirate-plancks.

1: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pirate%20ninj...

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#58

Post by bbcbasic »

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.

Kelvin, FTW

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#59

Post by make3 »

david-given wrote: post #11

From the article: "The box mimics the day-night patterns of Mars, as well as its temperature, air pressure and atmospheric composition." Wait, really? They're growing plants in what's practically a vacuum and at subzero temperatures? Really? That seems... stupendously unlikely... to me. Not that I wouldn't love to be wrong, mind. Anyone have a link to actual data? Everything linked to is just press fluff. Update: Act…

I wonder if we could do artificial selection, breeding a couple generations in progressively lower atmosphere, and only keeping those that don't go haywire

Re: Study: Potatoes can grow on Mars

#60

Post by kbenson »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #46
Waterluvian wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I get in on the joke? :)

The actor is Matt Damon. Parent spelled it Matt Daemon, as in a hypothetical *nix process at /sbin/mattd

If this were Reddit we could keep this going until we had a meme about Matt Damon running in the background of movies, and a whole corpus of images where he's been photoshopped to be doing just that.

Now I'm kind of regretting this conversation isn't on Reddit.

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