Recycling nutrients from organic waste for growing higher plants in the Micro Ecological Life Support System Alternative (MELiSSA) loop during long-term space missions.

Space agencies are developing Bioregenerative Life Support Systems (BLSS) in view of upcoming long-term crewed space missions. Most of these BLSS plan to include various crops to produce different types of foods, clean water, and O while capturing CO from the atmosphere. However, growing these plants will require the appropriate addition of nutrients in forms that are available.

What Could Explain δC Signatures in Biocrust Cyanobacteria of Drylands?

Dryland ecosystems are increasing in geographic extent and contribute greatly to interannual variability in global carbon dynamics. Disentangling interactions among dominant primary producers, including plants and autotrophic microbes, can help partition their contributions to dryland C dynamics. We measured the δC signatures of biological soil crust cyanobacteria and dominant plant species (C and C) across a regional scale in the southwestern USA to determine if biocrust cyanobacteria were coupled to plant productivity (using plant-derived C mixotrophically), or independent of plant activity (and therefore purely autotrophic).