scientists propose another doomsday vault moon

Of course, eventually, you would have more than one copy of all the seeds. A backup of all the knowledge of humankind, designed to last for thousands of years. Temperatures in the lunar cold traps can get as low as 38 K - far lower than that of liquid nitrogen which freezes at 63 K and boils at 77 K).We don't have anywhere on Earth where passive storage permits temperatures so low, even in Norway. For instance fresh lettuce seeds have a projected 'shelf life' of 3400 years in liquid nitrogen. Seeds can be preserved for even longer periods, up to thousands of years, in liquid nitrogen. Many seeds can survive for centuries in conditions like that before they need to be revived. This is similar to the -18 ☌ for the Svalbard Global Seed Vault and should be perfect for a passively cooled off world seed bank. Some of the lunar caves probably have an internal steady temperature of around -20 ☌ (see page 5 of this paper). It is easy to reach from Earth (when we have the technology once more to get back there) and geologically stable, and the caves are at just the right temperature naturally. However, if our aim is to look after Earth, as our first priority, the Moon is by far the best place for a backup, starting with an off-world seed vault.

We already have them with the seed vaults. But if we can’t look after our Earth, which is so hospitable to us, with the temperature just right, fresh water often falling from the sky to water our crops, air we can breathe, trees, plants, our food can grow almost anywhere, protection from cosmic radiation, solar storms and UV all filtered out naturally - if we can't look after this beautiful and so habitable planet, ideal for humans, how can we possibly build a civilization on Mars, with conditions so unbelievably harsh and difficult for us? He talks about a new colony that people can go to, if we need to abandon Earth. But we are doing this with a secure Earth behind us, a planet that we have preserved and kept habitable and in tip-top condition. Maybe eventually we have settlements that fill our solar system right out to Pluto and beyond. We can protect and preserve Earth so that we don't need to go extinct here either. Įlon Musk says there are two futures, to stay on Earth and eventually go extinct, or to become a 'multi-planetary species'. Add a vacuum sealed packet of dried seeds to a rover that explores a suitable lunar cave, and leave it there at the end of the mission, inside the rover, and that's it.That's the start of a future seed vault. The lunar caves are naturally at the right temperature. Within a few years we should have easy access to the Moon, and then it will be easy to do. We can start by storing seeds there, similar to the Svalbard seed vault in Norway.

I think we should build our first offworld backup on the Moon.

Scientists propose another doomsday vault moon