NASA Scientists Create Alien Crops Able to Thrive in the Red Planet’s Lethal Atmosphere

By ELEANOR MAYNE

FOR generations we have been obsessed by the possibility of life on Mars. From claims that it is populated by little green men and UFOs to H.G.

Wells’s book War Of The Worlds about a Martian invasion of Earth, lifeforms from the Red Planet have been a constant source of intrigue.

Until now the speculation has remained firmly in the realms of fantasy.

But NASA scientists have finally decided to make the dream of life on Mars come true by genetically engineering plants that can survive in the planet’s ferociously inhospitable atmosphere.

The US space agency is spending Pounds 400,000 on the two-year project which will take DNA from microbes able to grow in very extreme conditions on Earth and use it to build alien crops capable of thriving on Mars.

The experts have a massive task on their hands: the average temperature on the Martian surface is minus 63C, and the ‘air’ is rich in carbon dioxide and low in oxygen.

Because it lacks a protective atmospheric layer, the planet is also bathed in extremely dangerous levels of ultraviolet radiation from the sun.

NASA hopes the project will eventually make it possible to grow crops on Mars fit for human consumption, in order to provide a food supply for any future explorers.

Researchers at North Carolina State University have already started work on the project by taking DNA from very resilient microbes and inserting it into ordinary plant cells to make superstrong varieties.

As a result, the plant cells produce a compound which helps them to get rid of toxic substances produced because of environmental stress. Professor Wendy Boss, who is leading the team, is convinced they have the potential to make organisms that will be able to survive on Mars.

She said: ‘We know already that plants can adapt slowly to very low temperatures, but we need something that can not only adapt very quickly but that can actually grow. You want a food source and ideally something that can give you oxygen.’ Sharon Garrison, co- ordinator of NASA’s Institute for Advanced Concepts, which is funding the research, said its goal was ‘extremely important’.

She explained: ‘We will be going to Mars and we will need food to sustain ourselves when we get there. We are optimistic about the project we see this as a really crucial area.’ The alien plants will be tested at NASA laboratories which simulate space environments before being introduced to breeding programmes.

Scientists have only recently discovered the microbes, called extremophiles, which will form the basis of the Martian plants.

The ancient lifeforms are found in the most unlikely places on Earth, such as buried in Arctic ice or on the seabed. The microbes can survive without oxygen and light, at extreme temperatures or surrounded by noxious chemicals.

One hydrogen-eating species lives deep inside rock, while another thrives on control rods in the core of nuclear reactors, and is apparently resistant to levels of radiation a thousand times that which would kill a human.

The project, Redesigning Living Organisms For Mars, could also benefit people living in inhospitable parts of Earth by allowing more crops to be grown.