Israhell to shoot a Chia Pet capsule to the moon

[yankeedoodle]

For those who don't know what a Chia Pet is:


AN AMERICAN ICON: THE CHIA PET
https://www.chia.com/pages/about-chia-pets
Chia Pets are American icons featuring styled terracotta figurines used to grow chia seeds (Salvia hispanica), where the chia sprouts grow within a couple of weeks to resemble the animal's fur or hair. Moistened seeds of chia are applied to the grooved terracotta figurine body.

Marketed by Joe Pedott and produced by San Francisco, California-based company Joseph Enterprises, Inc., the first Chia Pets, the ram and the bull were created in the fall of 1981. Chia Pets and the corresponding television commercials achieved iconic popularity throughout the 1980s.

The catchphrase sung in the TV commercial as the plant grows in time lapse is "Ch-Ch-Ch-Chia!". This catchphrase originated at an agency brainstorming meeting, where one of the individuals present pretended to stutter the product name. As of 2019, more than 15 million Chia Pets were sold – mostly during the holiday season.

A range of styles have been produced, including several versions of puppies, kittens and frogs. Cartoon characters have also been licensed, including Trolls, Minnie Mouse, Garfield, Scooby-Doo, Looney Tunes, Shrek, The Simpsons, and Sponge Bob. Additionally, there are Chia Pets depicting presidents, including Abraham Lincoln, George Washington as well as Presidents Trump and Obama!

In 2003 Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, asked Joe Pedott to donate his company's papers, television advertising tapes and a selection of Chia Pets to the Behring archive center.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Chia is so much a part of American consumer lore that it was included in a New York Times time capsule, to be opened in the year 3000, along with a Purple Heart medal, a can of Spam and a Betty Crocker cookbook.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Chia is so much a part of American consumer lore that it was included in a New York Times time capsule, to be opened in the year 3000...

So, you see, tne New York Times put a Chia Pet in a time capsule, and, here we have an article where Israhell is all excited because somebody put what is, essentially, just a Chia Pet in a hermetically-sealed and astmospherically-controlled capsule and is planning to shoot it to the Moon, and see if they can make it land safely, and, if they manage to do that, they are going to have cameras inside so they can see if they can grow their Chia Pet on the Moon.   

Next up, Israel makes the moon bloom
UK-born Israeli scientist heads team that will send a tray of seeds and plants into space
https://www.thejc.com/news/news/next-up-israel-makes-the-moon-bloom-5rxCGkgS1raKgkfDlSvXoo?reloadTime=1666798636982

Israel, the country which famously made the desert bloom with drip irrigation, is now using tech to grow plants on the moon – and the man driving the project is a British-born Jew

Professor Simon Barak's team at a research institute located in Israel's Negev Desert is planning to send a chamber of seeds and plants into space in 2025.

"The chamber will be hermetically sealed with the atmosphere on the Earth and will contain a tray of seeds and plants," said Professor Barak who is coordinating plant biologists and imaging specialists at the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research at the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. His team Lunaria One includes scientists from Australia and South Africa.

"When it lands, the chamber will be powered up to provide lighting, water and warmth. The whole chamber cannot exceed 1.5 kilograms," explained Professor Barak

"We are currently researching which plants to include. Some will be in the form of seeds and other will be what are known as resurrection plants which contain almost no water and can remain dormant for years until revived by some."

Extreme temperatures and the lack of oxygen and atmosphere mean it is impossible to grow anything directly on the moon's surface.

They will travel aboard the Israel Space Agency's Beresheet 2 spacecraft and Barak will be monitoring them live with Ben-Gurion University colleagues Professor Aaron Fait and Dr Tarin Paz-Kagan.

"We will be able to take digital photos and hopefully have a 3D imagine camera which will give us growth data, and an infrared camera which will enable us to monitor the water status of the plants."

The journey will take four and a half months instead of the usual three days to travel to moon because after the rocket is launched the spaceship detaches and starts circling the Earth in larger and larger orbits until it intersects with the moon.

"Once we land, we will only have a 72-hour window for the experiment because that's all the power we have. Our other challenge will be watering the seeds and plants to ensure they grow enough to be imaged," he said.

If successful, the experiment will, he says, be the "first tiny steps in putting human communities on other planets."

"The Earth is finite, the sun will burn it out in about four billion years, so if we care about humanity, we need to reach for the stars."

"The experiment has enormous value for life on Earth and humanity's progress in space exploration. Examining plant growth under extreme conditions will help us [achieve] food security," said SpaceIL chief executive Shimon Sarid.

Meanwhile, science fiction enthusiasts need not worry about Day of the Triffids scenario unfolding on the moon: "Once the power runs out, the plants will die and either be boiled or frozen during the daytime or nighttime, respectively," said Professor Barak.