NASA has announced the winners of the second phase of the Deep Space Food Challenge, an initiative aimed at creating new food production technologies that can be used by astronauts. One of the companies selected for the final of the competition is the Air Company, which bet on a way to use the carbon dioxide exhaled in the breath for the production of nutrients.
Stafford Sheehan, CEO of the company, created the AIRMADE technology with the original purpose of converting carbon to produce highly pure alcohol for perfumes, jet fuel and vodkas. For NASA’s challenge, he needed to modify the invention to make it capable of producing edible proteins, carbohydrates and fats from the same system.
The idea is that the carbon dioxide obtained from the astronauts’ breath is mixed with gaseous hydrogen, extracted from water through electrolysis. The resulting mixture of alcohol and water is used to feed a small amount of yeast, producing a renewable source of single-cell proteins and other nutrients.
“The carbon dioxide and hydrogen form a store of alcohol to feed the yeast, and they are the food for humans,” he explained. The process yielded a unicellular protein drink with the consistency of a shake, designed for the needs of crews on long space missions — and, according to Sheehan, the shake tastes similar to seitan, a food similar to tofu.
“It’s definitely more nutritious than Tang,” said Sheehan, referring to the drink popularized by John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth. “And you still get that sweet, almost malty flavor,” he added. The process doesn’t have to be used only for protein drinks: it can also produce high carbohydrate shakes, replacing breads and pastas.
The AIRMADE technology yielded a prize of US$ 750,000 for the company. The other seven winning teams worked with an artificial photosynthesis process, gaseous fermentation technologies for the production of unicellular proteins and more. The final stage of the contest will have a prize of up to US$ 1.5 million, a sum that will be divided among the winners.
