Monthly Archives: August 2025

This spring brought us to the close of four years of design, development, and construction of a unique, world-class, hermetically sealed research facility for bioregeneration (air revitalization with plants) for long-duration human space exploration.

SAM is now actively hosting what will be the first of many years of experiments in which we grow a specific species of food cultivar to determine it’s growth rate and carbon sequestration against three Vapor Pressure Deficit values.

My graduate student Atila Meszaros and SAM Site Manager Luna Powell managed a perfectly executed test run of dwarf wheat, peas, and quinoa. The peas are a unique variety developed by Dr. Bruce Bugbee and his team at Utah State University. Smaller than standard, they produce a remarkably high seed yield–perfect for the Moon or Mars.

Furthermore, we are working with Dr. Lucie Poulet and her graduate student to determine key characteristics of the peas, including the density and dimensions of the leaves. All of this work is inspired by the legacy of NASA veteran Raymond Wheeler who was instrumental in motivating my dive into the world of bioregeneration in 2017 with my very first concept for SIMOC.

June through mid August saw completion of two full, six week runs of peas (2 weeks incubation at B2; 4 weeks in SAM) only to be met with the reality of one too many system failures and mistakes, forcing a total restart this past Thursday. That is the rigor of science–if the experiment is not done right, you do it again … and again. I am proud of Atila and Luna for not hesitating to set aside more than three months of hard, daily work in the name of solid science.

Our current experimental configuration is built around a nearly fully automated, computer controlled system that Atila, Luna, and Tanner Conrad, Research Technologist (under Dr. Murat Kacira) at UA CEAC assembled and programmed. It maintains a constant 800 ppm of CO2 such that by monitoring the amount of CO2 injected (from a cryogenic tank via gas manifold) we know the maturity of the peas and can plot, with a high degree of accuracy, the growth function and as such, ability for any food cultivar to revitalize cabin air.

The culmination of this series of experiments comes in October in conjunction with the World’s Biggest Analog where veteran SAM team member Matthias Beach will be sealed inside for two weeks. During the first week his CO2 will be sequestered by the peas (at least, that’s the hypothesis). On the morning of the 8th day he will harvest the peas, secure them in air-tight bags, and then complete the mission with no CO2 removal to demonstrate the amount of CO2 that was being sequestered by the plants.

This summer was one of adventure for the entire SAM crew.

Kai and Trent enjoyed a trip down the Grand Canyon mid-May with directors and volunteers for the National Space Society, the final voyage of this seasonal journey in memory of the incredible (and greatly missed) Anita Gale who departed planet Earth in May 2024.

Kai and Colleen attended the National Geographic Society’s Explorers Fest and then ventured on to Mongolia for six weeks, teaching English and exploring the foot of the country’s largest glacier, and kayaking wild rivers.

Kai Nevers and his partner Kate spent a month traveling around Greece and Italy … dnding the trip with a 1 week hut-to-hut hike in the Dolomites.

Trent was wreck diving with the Explorers Club in the Great Salt Lakes.

Luna enjoyed time with family in rural Maine and sought refuge from the summer heat in Northern Arizona.

Griffin took his first trip overseas and presented two papers for SAM at ICES 2025, Prague.

Atila explored the beaches and jungle of his home country Peru.

Bindhu attended the Humans to the Moon and Mars summit in Washington D.C. followed by the Aerospace Medical Association conference in Atlanta, Georgia, related to the SAM MedBay project. She visited a colleague from the Analog Astronaut Conference in England, where she rode her first wave on a surf board, visited the Eden Project, and prehistoric Stonehenge.

Nathan explored lava tubes in Hawaii.

Shantano got his first, single author paper accepted to the CAIP conference, presented at the Sagan Summer Workshop for a hands-on project on occurence rate of exoplanets, and captured a thunderstorm and Saturn’s moon Titan on his phone.

And Matthias ventured to Devon Island with the Mars Society as XO for the Advance Team to prepare the Flashline station for Missions 17 and 18.

And somehow, despite the incredible travel, we got a lot done at SAM!