How to bake bread in space.
From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.
“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of founder of the Mars Society.
Available everywhere for $3.99 (before discount) at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all ebook vendors, or direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit. And if you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.
From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.
“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of founder of the Mars Society.
Available everywhere for $3.99 (before discount) at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all ebook vendors, or direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit. And if you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.
I wonder if someone will put this to test in a nanoracks configuration. Just think, water, CO2, and flour in and dinner rolls out, more or less continuously.
This sounds like a NASA answer to a question with a far simpler answer.
Just use yeast. And wait the hour.
It took NASA 3 years and a million dollars to design a way to write in space. The space pen. The soviets sent up a few pencils.
Patrick,
Though you know I am not a fan of NASA’s bureaucracy and overspending, the “space pen story” is actually not true. It never happened. It is one of those urban legends that people repeat because it sounds true, which tells us a great deal about how NASA does things in real life. They may not spend millions to design a space pen, but they certainly do not make it easy for scientists and engineers to innovate and be creative.
As for using yeast in space to make bread, I wonder if doing so might pose some real engineering problems. For example, plants do not grow easily or naturally in space. It takes a great deal of complex engineering and care for them to prosper. I suspect the same might apply to yeast, though I admit I am unaware of any actual experiments to test it. However, finding a simple chemical substitute that also uses less energy seems to me to be a smart engineering solution. And this article proposes just such a thing. We shouldn’t dismiss it lightly.
That system only uses less energy if you discount making the co2 water and then finding a way to mix it all inside a pressure vessel before you release the pressure to make the bubbles.
Also the assumption that we would be on a micro small spaceship with a galley the size of a closet in my opinion is way wrong. If we are going to out there long enough to bake bread then I bet we would have a few more square feet to use.
Even the station we have now is bigger than that.
As for keeping yeast a long time, drying it is not easy for the home chemist but quite possible in a small lab. Just keep samples of it dry until needed.
Plus you can’t make wine with just CO2. What are they going to drink a year out from the earth?
Vodka