THIS PROJECT BRINGS ESTABLISHED RESEARCH FROM NASA FUNDED SCIENCE ON THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION INTO AN INTERNATIONAL PROJECT LED BY DLR TOWARD THE FUNCTIO...

THIS PROJECT BRINGS ESTABLISHED RESEARCH FROM NASA FUNDED SCIENCE ON THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION INTO AN INTERNATIONAL PROJECT LED BY DLR TOWARD THE FUNCTIONALIZATION OF PLANT GROWTH IN SUPPORT OF HUMAN EXPLORATION. IMAGING TECHNOLOGIES DEVELOPED AS PART OF ONGOING ISS SCIENCE WILL BE DEPLOYED WITHIN THE ANTARCTIC EDEN ISS PLANT PRODUCTION UNIT TO PROVIDE TELE-SCIENCE SUPPORT AND PLANT SCIENCE ANALYTICS TO BETTER UNDERSTAND THE RESPONSES OF PLANTS, AND PRODUCTION SUPPORT TO OPTIMIZE PLANT PERFORMANCE. PLANT PRODUCTION FOR ADVANCED LIFE SUPPORT WITHIN DEEP SPACE AND EXTRATERRESTRIAL COLONIES HAS LONG BEEN AN APPRECIATED AREA OF TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT. INDEED ISS SCIENCE IS NOW IS TURNING TOWARD SMALL SCALE PLANT PRODUCTION IN SPACE, AND PLANT PRODUCTION UNITS IN EXTREME ENVIRONMENTS ON EARTH HAVE PROVEN THE VALUE OF FRESH FOOD. HOWEVER, THERE HAS AS YET TO BE ANY INTEGRATED TESTS OF PLANT PRODUCTION WITHIN SPACE VEHICLE-LIKE STRUCTURES IN EXTREME ANALOG ENVIRONMENTS.TO ADDRESS THIS

GAP IN KNOWLEDGE, THE EDEN ISS PROJECT BY THE DLR GERMAN SPACE AGENCY IS DESIGNED TO PLACE AN ISS-INSPIRED MODULE IN THE CONTEXT OF AN ESTABLISHED ANTARCTIC STATION, DRAWING TOGETHER FOR THE FIRST TIME STRUCTURES AND PRODUCTION UNITS DESIGNED TO SPACE VEHICLE FORMATS TOGETHER WITH THE CHALLENGES OF AN EXTREME AND ISOLATED ENVIRONMENT. IN KEEPING WITH THE SPIRIT AND INTENT OF THE EDEN ISS PROJECT, THE CURRENT PROPOSAL SEEKS TO FUND US PARTICIPATION, BRINGING PLANT IMAGING TECHNOLOGIES DEVELOPED, IN PART FROM EXTENSIVE SHUTTLE AND ISS PLANT GROWTH EXPERIMENTS, INTO THE SCIENCE TO BE CONDUCTED WITHIN EDEN ISS. THE AREA OF FIDELITY TO BE ADDRESSED BY THIS PROJECT IS A SERIES OF SCIENCE INVESTIGATIONS DESIGNED TO FURTHER PLANETARY RESEARCH IN TERRESTRIAL EXTREME ENVIRONMENTS THAT MAY BE ANALOGOUS TO THOSE FOUND ON OTHER PLANETS. THE EDEN ISS PROJECT IS CONSTRUCTING ESSENTIAL CONTROLLED ENVIRONMENT AGRICULTURE TECHNOLOGIES USING BOTH AN INTERNATIONAL STANDARD PAYLOAD RACK CULTIVATION SYSTEM TO RELATE TO ON-BOARD ISS AND CIS-LUNAR DEPLOYMENTS FOR CREW FOOD SUPPLEMENTATION, AND A FUTURE EXPLORATION GREENHOUSE THAT IS DESIGNED WITH RESPECT TO FUTURE PLANETARY BIOREGENERATIVE LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEM DEPLOYMENTS. THE OVERALL PHYSICAL FACILITY, REFERRED TO AS THE EDEN ISS MOBILE TEST FACILITY, WILL PROVIDE REALISTIC MASS FLOW AND WILL DEPLOY TO THE HIGHLY-ISOLATED ANTARCTIC NEUMAYER STATION III, OPERATED BY THE ALFRED WEGENER INSTITUTE. AMONG THE TECHNOLOGIES TO BE DEVELOPED AND DEPLOYED WILL BE IMAGERS DESIGNED BY THE UF PI TEAM, THROUGH THIS PROPOSED PROJECT, TO MONITOR PLANT HEALTH WITHIN THE MOBILE TEST FACILITY. OUR MAJOR GOAL IS TO EQUIP THE PLANT GROWTH SYSTEMS WITH INFORMATION-RICH IMAGING SUCH THAT PLANT HEALTH AND BASIC SCIENCE DATA CAN BE REVIEWED BY A LARGE AND INTEGRATED SCIENCE BACKROOM BACK ON EARTH . AN ADDITIONAL GOAL IS TO OPTIMIZE THE CONCEPTUAL CONNECTIONS BETWEEN EDEN ISS AND CURRENT ISS CAPABILITIES AND OPERATIONS. THESE TWO GOALS BRING A DIRECTED FOCUS TO THE PROJECT, CONNECTING THE PLANETARY SURFACE ANALOG CONCEPTS TO NEAR TERM OPERATIONS OF ISS AND POTENTIAL CIS-LUNAR HABITATS. TO ACCOMPLISH THESE GOALS, SPECTRAL IMAGING OF PLANTS WILL BE INCORPORATED INTO TYPICAL DATA MONITORING SYSTEMS AND OPERATION OF THE PROJECT. EDEN ISS, AS A LARGE MULTINATIONAL PROJECT, HAS AN EXTENSIVE DATA MANAGEMENT PLAN (DMP). THE WORK PROPOSED HERE WILL DEPEND AND DRAW UPON THE EDEN ISS DMP FOR THE OVERALL PROJECT DATA, AND WILL SPECIFICALLY DRAW MTF PLANT GROWTH IMAGES AND OPERATIONS IMAGES AS PRIMARY DATA FOR ANALYSIS AND MANAGEMENT BY THE UF TEAM. THE UF TEAM WILL ARCHIVE AND MAKE AVAILABLE ALL PLANT HEALTH IMAGES SPECIFIC TO OUR TASKS VIA A SEPARATE PROJECT WITHIN THE NASA LIFE SCIENCES DATA ARCHIVE (LSDA). THE TECHNOLOGY IS BASED ON SMALL, ROBUST CAMERAS THAT IMAGE WAVELENGTHS RELATED TO PREVIOUS AND FUTURE ISS HARDWARE SUCH THAT DATA FROM EDEN ISS WILL PROVIDE FEED FORWARD SCIENCE FOR KNOWN AND ANTICIPATED ISS AND HABITAT PLANT GROWTH HARDWARE.
Solicitation ID/Procurement Identifier: 80NSSC17K0199
Ultimate Completion Date: Fri Aug 14 17:00:00 GMT 2020