Growing Beyond Earth Update

Over the past weeks the GBE student team has been persistently working on their final growing chamber prototype, Tetra Eden, for Phase II of the Growing Beyond Earth Maker Contest. The challenge, sponsored by NASA and Fairchild Botanical Garden, is to build a working growing chamber for growing red lettuce in a 50cm cube.

The team’s inventive approach uses a tetrahedron shape to optimize packing efficiency in irregular spaces while optimizing surface area for growing. While the challenge only asked the team to consider optimizing growing space within a cubic shape the Mason GBE Team determined that the triangular bipyramid design would optimize packing efficiency within irregular shaped spaces. This modular design allows scaleability of the growing chamber into other irregular shaped areas aboard the International Space Station or for longer term space travel.

The team has been able to continue their prototyping efforts in their homes with remote support from the MIX mentor team. The team plans to have their final design complete by June 24th.