Optical Ethylene Sensor for Plant Health

Future long-duration manned space flights will rely upon onboard production facilities to grow and produce food throughout the mission. Because the lives of the mission participants will depend upon successful agricultural and horticultural practices, it is imperative to provide them with sophisticated diagnostic tools with which to assure success. Continuous real-time monitoring of gaseous species in the ambient environment is required. There are several gases vital to this application including ethylene, oxygen, and carbon dioxide. Vista Photonics proposes to develop a rugged, real-time, 15 parts-per-billion (ppb) gaseous ethylene analyzer, ultimately compatible with space flight. The sensor technology developed on this project will be further capable of high-performance detection of additional trace gases including moisture and plant respiratory oxygen and carbon dioxide.