Eating Space Vegetables, Wearing Astronauts’ “Same Style”… Aerospace Technology Enters Ordinary People’s Home

On April 24th, we will celebrate the 8th China Aerospace Day.In recent years, China’s aerospace industry has made rapid development and progress, from the “Chang’e” mission to the moon to the “Tianwen” exploration of fire, from the “Beidou” benefiting humanity to the “Tiangong” opening up for visitors. China’s aerospace industry has broken through the boundaries of human exploration of the universe with various scientific and technological innovations.However, when we temporarily leave the vast starry sky and look around, we may find that many “towering” aerospace technologies have already “descended” to us, and they are showcasing their skills in multiple fields, quietly changing our daily lives.12.jpgDelicious and Safe Space Fruits and Vegetables Come to the Dining Table of the PeopleThe delicious and juicy “Hanggua” and “Hanggua Yuni” fruit cucumbers with cute names often share a common breeding source – space.Every summer, when fruits and vegetables are ripe, the core demonstration base of aerospace breeding located in Tongzhou District, Beijing is bustling with people. Planters and seed distributors from all over the country shuttle through the fields, leading researchers to select their favorite fruit and vegetable varieties.Zhao Hui, Secretary General of the Aerospace Breeding Industry Innovation Alliance, stated that under the special environment of space, the seed mutation cycle is shortened and the mutation frequency is increased. Compared to the Earth’s surface environment, the space environment can promote more abundant genetic mutations in seeds, providing breeding scientists with more beneficial mutation materials and facilitating the cultivation of new varieties.Since 1987, when China first sent rice, pepper and other crop seeds into space, China has sent thousands of plant seeds into space for more than 30 times through recoverable satellites or manned spacecraft, including grain seeds such as wheat and sorghum, vegetable seeds such as cucumber and tomato, and fruit seeds such as melon and cherry. Since the launch of the Chinese space station mission, the Shenzhou-12 and Shenzhou-13 manned spacecraft have brought back over a thousand pieces of space breeding materials such as crop seeds and microbial strains from space. Among them, the seeds with the longest “business trip” time have been in orbit for 11 months.Radiation breeding is a commonly used breeding method in the agricultural field both domestically and internationally, and space is an excellent place to provide a radiation environment for seeds. Moreover, space can provide a more complex radiation environment than the earth, in which cosmic rays, microgravity environment, etc. can enhance the mutation probability of plant genes, thus making them produce more profound changes.Safety is always a topic that cannot be avoided in the development of space breeding. Are these “delicacies” cultivated in space safe enough?Zhao Hui stated that physical radiation breeding has a history of nearly a century in the world, and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the International Atomic Energy Agency have already classified space breeding as a type of physical radiation breeding. There are over 3300 commercially available varieties that have undergone radiation breeding and are well documented. Practice has proven that they all have no food safety issues.Zhao Hui further explained that inducing plant trait variation through space environment is the result of genetic mutations within the plant itself, and does not involve the introduction of foreign genes. “The safety of space breeding is determined.It is understood that scientists have conducted preliminary experiments on the seeds brought back by the Shenzhou 12 manned spacecraft. The staff of the National Plant Aerospace Breeding Engineering Technology Research Center have found through experiments that the Shenzhou-12 space mission has caused significant biological effects on the two returned rice seeds, and is expected to produce significant heritable variations.At present, China has cultivated over 700 new strains and varieties of aerospace breeding, of which more than 200 have been approved by the state or provincial level, with an annual planting area of over 30 million acres, achieving good social and economic benefits.13.jpgWearing the same outfit as astronauts is no longer unattainableWhen we see Chinese astronauts living and working freely on the “Tiangong” space station on TV, we are bound to be attracted by their neat and stylish cabin work clothes. In fact, many innovative technologies have emerged in the research and development process of China’s space suits, which have been used in mass products. Nowadays, wearing the same clothing as astronauts is no longer unattainable.In the manned space mission of Shenzhou 12, the astronauts’ cabin work clothes and other supplies were developed by domestic companies. The requirements for design, materials, and manufacturing of astronaut work clothes and other products are very strict, which is not only a challenge for the Chinese clothing industry, but also a great opportunity to achieve leapfrog upgrading.The person in charge of relevant technology research and development told reporters that in order to meet the requirements of antibacterial, flame retardant, wear resistance, and anti-static properties of domestic spaceship work clothes, they must overcome many technical difficulties. There are strict requirements for the presence of bacteria on products in the spaceship work clothes, and some antibacterial requirements even exceed the relevant standards for medical supplies. In addition, due to the relatively narrow cabin environment and a large number of instruments and equipment, astronauts need their clothing to have high wear resistance when traveling in this environment.On this basis, R&D personnel apply the technology applied to products such as spaceship work clothes to daily outdoor equipment development, optimizing and comprehensively upgrading products aimed at ordinary consumers.For example, in the process of developing aerospace clothing, researchers adopted an antibacterial technology that can effectively penetrate bacterial walls, thereby inhibiting bacterial growth. After multiple washes, the antibacterial rate remains above 90%. At present, this technology has been applied to the production of some outdoor clothing. In addition, relevant anti-static technologies have also been applied to autumn and winter clothing, which can effectively solve annoying static electricity problems.Not only can astronauts’ “same style” clothing be worn by the public, but materials used in spacecraft applications can also be used in clothing manufacturing.For example, in order to resist the temperature test of Mars’ “ice and fire double sky”, aerogel materials are used on the surface of the “Tianwen 1” Mars probe and the “Zhurong” Mars rover. Jin Zhong, a professor from the College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering of Nanjing University, said that aerogel materials can be divided into two types: high temperature resistant and low temperature resistant. They can not only block the high temperature heat flow up to 1200 degrees Celsius generated by the detector landing engine, but also protect the normal function of the landing platform; It can also ensure that the Mars rover can still operate normally in an environment below -130 degrees Celsius. In addition, the extremely light weight of aerogel will not increase the load of the Tianwen 1 Mars probe. Take the aerogel material on the detector as an example. If it is made into thin sheets, only 10g of this material is needed to pave the sheets on a standard football field.”The most promising large-scale application fields of aerogel are thermal insulation, thermal insulation and energy conservation.” Jinzhong said that there is great potential to replace traditional thermal insulation materials with aerogel in the fields of architecture, clothing and industrial production. At present, the research and development team of a domestic clothing brand has overcome the defects of aerogel such as weak material, easy powder loss, and unsuitable cutting through technical improvement. aerogel materials have been successfully applied to the civil clothing industry, and mass production has been achieved. Now ordinary consumers can enjoy the same thermal insulation treatment as spacecraft.