Ground Controls For Space Radishes

A view of radishes growing in the Advanced Plant Habitat (APH) ground unit inside the Space Station Processing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Dec. 14, 2020.
The radishes are a ground control crop for the Plant Habitat-02 (PH-02) experiment. The experiment also involves growing two similar radish crops inside the International Space Station’s APH. NASA astronaut Kate Rubins harvested the first crop on Nov. 30, and the second harvest aboard the orbiting laboratory is planned for Dec. 30.

Once samples return to Earth, researchers will compare those grown in space to the radishes grown here on Earth to better understand how microgravity affects plant growth.

KSC-20201214-PH-KLS01_0044 Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett Larger image