Source: www.TurfMagazine.com
LEBANON, Pa. – LebanonTurf has announced that two of its products will be sent to the International Space Station as part of a new round of zero-gravity scientific tests.
ROOTS Healthy Start 3-4-3 and ROOTS PHC BioPak, two soil care and fertilization products from LebanonTurf, will be sent to the International Space Station on Mission 4 as part of an experiment designed to examine how a zero-gravity environment affects bacteria’s ability to decompose organic matter. Both products use microbes and bacteria to break down organic fertilizers in soil and fertilize roots.
Ninth- and tenth-grade students at Jamestown High School in Jamestown, Pa., under the direction of biology teacher Harry Rohrsbach, created the notion for this experiment. The students submitted their idea to the Student Spaceflights Experiments Program, a group that selects student-organized experiments for testing in low Earth orbit.
The launch is tentatively scheduled for Dec. 17, 2013, from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Va.
For more information on Mission 4 to the International Space Station, visit the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program website.
Photo: SSEP experiment creators Cade Lamont, Sydney Holler, Jason Liszka and Trey Saulsbery from Jamestown High School in Jamestown, Pa.