Colonizing Mars: Will Hydroponic Tower Gardens Suffice?

As “NASA aims to launch astronauts to Mars by the late 2030s or early 2040s,” astronauts are in need of a system to provide food regularly on extended space missions (Howell, 2022). The current use of packaged food will only last for so long, and the nutrients in the packaged food will continuously be lost over time. Hydroponic tower gardens could be the solution to this problem. Hydroponic tower gardens constructed on Mars in a temperature-and-atmosphere-regulated structure may be able to produce the sustainable harvest astronauts need for long-duration missions. Therefore, Project HART’s research program aims to determine the most efficient conditions for using hydroponic tower gardens as a gardening technique for astronauts on Mars. The research conducted includes the water and nutrient input, day and night cycle with temperature regulation, lighting sources, and gravitational processes. The ability to grow food on Mars will not only produce a reliable diet for astronauts but provide the psychological benefits of gardening that astronauts would not be able to gain alternatively