Blue Origin manufactured solar cell prototype from lunar regolith simulants

Re:Blue Origin manufactured solar cell prototype from lunar ... by wonderwonder on Tuesday February 14, 2023 @03:52PM (#34795788)

Food, power, shelter and air are essentially the big issues for space colonization. With the lab protein I was speaking of the possibility of shipping a close to self sustaining bio reactor in a box to a colony to solve for the food issue. I mentioned this as it's an evolving technology that may be closer to prime time at the same time as the solar panels concept the article mentioned.

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Re:Blue Origin manufactured solar cell prototype from lunar ... by outworlder on Tuesday February 14, 2023 @04:29PM (#34796320)

> I mentioned this as it's an evolving technology that may be closer to prime time

Unlikely. We have yet to master nutrition when it comes from plants, it will be even worse for a bioreactor. Unfortunately, the list of food ingredients that you see listed in minimum recommended intake values is woefully incomplete. There's a whole bunch of micronutrients we get from food that are difficult to replicate.

Bioreactors could be useful for making supplements (say, Omega-3) to offset specific deficiencies.

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Re:Blue Origin manufactured solar cell prototype from lunar ... by idlewords on Tuesday February 14, 2023 @07:10PM (#34798161)

Consider that such a technology would make anyone who invented it on Earth a billionaire many times over. But it's hard to do, even with plants and gravity.

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