COLORADO SPRINGS – NASA-funded “Growing Beyond Earth” (GBE) announced the winners on May 9 of their annual Student Research Symposium. A project by two students from Thrive Home School Academy placed in the top 10% of schools participating, receiving a special merit award for their use of national project data.
Amelia Anderson and Mele Jones, 11th graders at Thrive, participated in GBE to search for the perfect food plants to feed astronauts, in partnership with NASA’s Veggie Project and the Fairchild Botanical Gardens in Florida. For the past seven years, students from across the country have been providing NASA scientists with data on the best plant candidates to optimize growing conditions to maximize yield. This is Thrive’s fourth year to participate in the project under the direction of Dara Gardner, Thrive science teacher.
The students compiled their data after a semester-long research project using a variable LED light chamber, then presented to NASA scientists and botanists from University of Wisconsin in the virtual symposium, which included students from 60 schools from Canada, US, Puerto Rico, and Trinidad. Their project titled “The Power of Blue: The Effects of Varying Blue Light on the Edible Mass of Crunchy Crimson Radishes,” utilized data from three crops grown from October 2021 until March 2022. A total of 300 middle and high schools participated in the fall project, and 60 projects were selected to create original research for the spring project, culminating in the research symposium.