As humans venture into space, the presence of well-grown plants may become essential to keeping astronauts healthy. They can make natural medicine in outer space.
During this time, astronauts carry drugs when carrying out space missions. For example, the crew of the Apollo 11 mission that landed on the Moon carried antibiotics, painkillers, nasal sprays, and sleeping pills among other drugs.
Quoted from Labiotech.eu, the International Space Station is also preparing supplies of medicines and medical equipment to deal with emergencies such as appendicitis surgery, for example.
As humans increasingly travel to space, experts are confirming that the way we manufacture drugs is not suitable for long-distance missions like outer space.
"The International Space Station is "close enough" that you can ship things as needed and you can evacuate someone for a medical emergency," said Karen McDonald, professor at the University of California, Davis.
His research includes studying alternative ways to produce drugs that could supply the needs of prospective missions to Mars.
"Distance is the main problem and challenge of exploring Mars. Medicines will expire for missions to Mars. There may be some unknown situations that arise so you need to make quick action as you cannot rely on supplies from Earth. It will be too long before get there," he said.
Plants as medicine factories
Many drugs, such as aspirin, are produced chemically. However, in recent years, a new generation of biologic drugs has begun to dominate the market. Most of these drugs are produced in bioreactors by Chinese hamster ovary cells, or CHO cells.
"The kind of equipment you need to grow these cells is very complex, because they are fragile," said Sancha Salgueiro, CEO of consulting firm Chart Biotechnology.
Plants, on the other hand, do not need such complex equipment. "You just need to be able to grow the plant," Salgueiro said, adding that using plants to make medicine would mean sending astronauts on long-distance missions with the means to make the drug, not the drug itself.
"If we're concerned about cancer, for example, there might be five or six different antibody drugs for different cancers that we want to have out there, but those antibodies might only have a shelf life of two years," says Julian Ma. He is a professor at St. George's University of London who has studied how to produce drugs in plants for decades.
"The great thing about plant seeds is that they last forever with very little degradation. In space, you can open seed tubes, grow plants, and harvest the antibodies you need," he explained.
In addition, according to him, plants have become important cargo in space missions. "Plants will be used for food. Plants consume carbon dioxide, which is abundant on Mars, and they produce the oxygen we need, and water. Plus, from experience on the International Space Station, having plants also has psychological benefits for crew members." the lid.