Alabama duo speak at Deep Space Food Challenge

Kimberly Ballard

WASHINGTON — Deep Space Food Challenge – this competition won’t be on the Food Network, but is really out of this world.

Angela Herblet, project manager for the challenge at the Marshall Space Flight Center, and Denise Morris, program manager for Centennial Challenges at Marshall, will take part in the event this weekend at the NYCxDESIGN Festival in New York.

Herblet, Morris and Ralph Fritsche, senior project manager for space crop production at  Kennedy Space Center, will announce the second phase winners of the Deep Space Food Challenge. This global competition helps develop food systems for long-term exploration missions.

The event will stream live online from the Smart Design studio in the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

The teams will also showcase some of their food production technologies.

In the evening, NASA speakers, including Morris and Herblet, will take part in a panel discussion on design, innovation, and the future of food.

Since January 2021, teams have been designing and building food tech solutions that would help keep astronauts safe, healthy, and productive for missions lasting years at a time.

The Challenge is a first-of-its-kind collaboration between NASA and Canadian Space Agency. On April 27, CSA awarded prizes to the teams advancing to the final stage of the Canadian challenge, which runs in parallel with NASA’s.

The not-for-profit Methuselah Foundation administers the competition for U.S. and international teams through a Space Act Agreement with NASA.

The Deep Space Food Challenge is part of NASA’s Prizes, Challenges, and Crowdsourcing program in the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate.

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