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A Tuskegee University research team has developed paper from inedible sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas), peanut (Arachis hypogea), and soybean (Glycine max) plant residues for NASA's Advanced Life Support Program (ALS) for sustaining human life in space. The objective was to develop papers that could be used as a media for inocula and characterize their physical and mechanical properties. The tensile fracture behavior, micromorphological analysis, and fracture surface examination of peanut shells, sweetpotato stems, soybean pods, and a combination of sweetpotato stems (60%) / peanut shells (40%) papers were also investigated. The ultimate strength was 2.6 MPa, 9.2 MPa, 7.1 MPa and 6.5 MPa, respectively. All samples performed well as a media inocula.

Several plant growth systems have been tested for crop production in microgravity and lunar/Mars environments in support of NASA's Advanced Life Support Program and long-term human space missions. These systems have incorporated such design features as the nutrient film technique (NFT), microporous plates, microporous tubes, and expandable boundary chambers and have been developed and used to support sweetpotato production at Tuskegee University. In the present research, the performance of different sweetpotato cultivars in a microporous tube system with lunar simulant medium was studied. The lunar simulant is an inert aggregate with an average particle size of about 3 mm. Buried in this solid medium is a microporous tube. Nutrient solution is circulated through the microporous tube under a slight negative pressure. This pressure is controlled to allow a slight seepage from the tube with some accumulation of water in the solid medium, but no free water.