Fin frontier: Why fish farms on the moon may be closer than you think

The Lunar Hatch project is studying whether aquaculture might be able to provide a source of protein for astronauts on space missions

- By Kim Willsher PALAVAS-LES-FLOTS

At first glance, there doesn't seem to be anything special about the sea bass circling around a tank in the small scientific facility on the outskirts of Palavas-les-Flots in southern France. But these fish are on a mission.

When the fish are fully grown, they will produce offspring that will be the first to be launched into space as part of a scientific project called Lunar Hatch that is exploring whether sea bass can be farmed on the moon - and eventually Mars - as food for future astronauts.

The project is the brainchild of Dr Cyrille Przybyla, a researcher in marine biology for the French National Institute for Ocean Research, who will be watching the fish's progress like any anxious parent.

"Fish is an excellent source of protein because it is the animal organism that we digest the best and it has omega 3 and important B vitamins that will be needed for astronauts in space to maintain muscle mass," Przybyla said. "The question was: how can we produce food that far away?"

The answer is, he says, to blast the eggs into space where they will hatch in the time it takes to get to the International Space Station (ISS). Initially, the fish will simply be observed before being frozen and returned to Earth but eventually the idea is that they will be farmed on the moon.

Przybyla is confident that should the world's space agencies decide to build a moon base, Lunar Hatch will be able to put sea bass on the menu at least twice a week.

Sending fish into space is not new. The first "aquastronauts", as they have been called, to make the journey were tiny fish known as mummichogs (Fundulus heteroclitus) sent into orbit on one of the Apollo missions in 1973. Until then, these unremarkable creatures had rarely ventured far from brackish creeks and coastal waters or salt marshes.