NASA has a long history of partnering with university plant researchers to understand how plants respond to growing in space. Dr. Simon Gilroy is a professor in the Botany Department at UW-Madison. His research has centered on how plants take in information such as the direction of light, or the force of gravity and use this to regulate their patterns of growth and development. He was an author of the recent Decadal Survey from the National Academies that outlined the next 10 years of research for NASA in the biological and physical sciences and in 2014 he took over as president of the American Society for Gravitational and Space Research. Most recently he has been fortunate to be able to put his research onto the International Space Station as part of a study to help understand how plants respond to the weightless environment of space.
During his talk, Dr. Gilroy will review the kinds of plant research going on in space and some of the recent work from UW-Madison. He will also discuss the problems that still need to be solved, whether plants need gravity to grow normally and how close we are to using plants in a bioregenerative life support system to provide food and replenish the air in long-term spaceflight.
Drinks, hors d'oeuvres and dinner will be served.
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R.S.V.P. by December 6
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Daniel Kiedrowski (
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