A new mission will transport coffee and cannabis plant cultures to space in order to study the effects of zero gravity on their metabolic pathways.
Cannabis and coffee are heading to the International Space Station, and SpaceX is giving them a ride. Agri-tech company Front Range Biosciences® has partnered with SpaceCells USA Inc., which is funding and managing the project, to send tissue cultures of two of the world’s favorite substances into the cosmos. They will be studied by BioServe Space Technologies at the University of Colorado, Boulder to see how plant cells go through any gene expression changes or genetic mutations while in space.
Coffee and hemp samples from Front Range Biosciences® (FRB) will board a SpaceX CRS-20 cargo flight, which is scheduled for liftoff in March, 2020. From there, the material will head to the International Space Station (ISS), where the cultures will be examined under BioServe’s controlled conditions in an incubator aboard the ISS—with a little help from NASA astronauts.
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