Florida Scientists To Send Seeds to ISS To Study Farming Solutions for Earth’s Harsh Conditions

As drought and extreme heat test American farmers more than ever, University of Florida researchers are looking to another harsh environment to create durable crops: space.  

Wagner Vendrame, professor in the UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Science (UF/IFAS) environmental horticulture department and part of UF’s Astraeus Space Institute, will send four types of UF-bred seeds to the International Space Station on Thursday afternoon on the payload of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The Cape Canaveral launch will take a manned crew to the ISS via SpaceX’s Dragon capsule.  

The seeds – strawberries from the Tampa Bay region, two types of Florida orchids and a type of turf grass – will remain untouched on the space station for about a week and will return on the next scheduled return trip to Earth, at which point Vendrame will germinate the seeds and test the genes of the grown plants for changes that only come from space flight.  

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