The students in Ms. Roxane Dubois-Rickard’s class at École St-Pierre recently studied the effects of space on plants and seeds.
While participating in Let's Talk Science's Tomatosphere programs, students used tomato seeds "from space" to study the effects of the space environment on their germination.
As part of the Tomatosphere program, participating classrooms receive two packages of tomato seeds. One package contains seeds sent into space or treated in space-simulated conditions. The other contains untreated "control" seeds.
Students plant the seeds and conduct experiments to explore the effects of the space environment on the germination of tomatoes.
Through Tomatosphere, students learn how to conduct a scientific experiment and compare the number of seeds that germinate for the two groups of seeds.
While completing the Tomatosphere program, students investigate how to supply space exploration missions with life-support requirements—food, water, oxygen and a way to consume the carbon dioxide exhaled by astronauts—while also discussing the many issues and research involved in space exploration.
