The first seeds that was sent to space

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Today I'll share an agricultural fun fact with everyone on Steemit. Did you know that maize seeds where the first crop seeds to be in space?

In 1946, scientists put some maize seeds on a rocket and sent the seeds into space after World War II ended. They had no clue if radiation would kill the seeds or if they would survive being so far away from earth. They grew when they came back to Earth, so growth can happen in the atmosphere.

Because of advancement in technology, our understanding of space and space travels, it sounds easy and simple to us now, but remember that no one knew what to think back then, so all they did was send seeds and wait to see what would happen.

Then, in 1982, Arabidopsis was the first plant to actually complete its life cycle in space by growing, flowering and producing seeds without gravity to pull it down like plants are used to. All of that made gives me some hope for the future because it showed us something about how resilient we are, how adaptable our crops can be, it showed us that life can find a way regardless of terrain. Elon Musk wants to achieve his goals of mars exploration, agriculture will be very important thing to tackle when we finally get there. I am wondering if any of the first scientists expected the seeds to live. They had to take the leap of faith and try. I believe most of our discoveries happen the same way.

Now we talk about farming on Mars from a point of knowing that there's a potential for seeds to survive in space. There's so much more we can do with agriculture in space when the time comes.