#LettuceOnMars, a student project from the University’s Spaceflight Society, has reached the finals of an international competition, run by Mars One, to land experiments on Mars.
Help them win the competition by voting here.
#LettuceOnMars is now one of the ten short-listed university projects, and the only UK entry, that was selected for technical feasibility and popularity. The winning payload will arrive on Mars in 2018 together with the official Mars One experiments.
The aim of the Southampton project is to send a small greenhouse to Mars in which lettuce will be grown using the atmosphere and sunlight on Mars.
The team now need the votes of the general public to be chosen as the winner and realise their plan to grow lettuce on Mars. Voting is open now and closes on 31 December 2014.
Project leader Suzanna Lucarotti, says: “To live on other planets we need to grow food there. No-one has ever actually done this and we intend to be the first. This plan is both technically feasible and incredibly ambitious in its scope, for we will be bringing the first complex life to another planet.”