RESEARCHERS GROW CROPS WITHOUT SUNLIGHT

We learned it in grade school: plants grow by using carbon dioxide and sunshine in a process called photosynthesis.

Or not.

At the University of California Riverside, scientists are growing crops in the dark to see if they can improve energy efficiency.

Photosynthesis uses only about 1 percent of the solar power that plants collect. Higher energy efficiency could mean bigger plants and greater yields.

The researchers combined carbon dioxide and water with salt and a few other additives and shot an electric current through the mix. 

The current converted the blend into acetate, not only the main ingredient of vinegar but also a food for primitive edibles including yeast, green algae, and mycelium, which produces mushrooms.

The new process for growing algae was four times more energy-efficient than photosynthesis and a whopping 18 times more for yeast.

But people aren’t going to sit down to a bowl of algae and yeast.

The researchers found that canola, cowpeas, green peas, rice, and tomatoes were able to “take the acetate we provided and build it into the major molecular building blocks an organism needs to grow and thrive,” even when grown in the dark, the researchers said in a statement describing their work.

TRENDPOST: In addition to growing crops in outer space, the new grow-in-the-dark technology could allow food to be grown indoors or to create a year-round growing season in places where sunlight is weak, such as far northern latitudes.

Also, the new method could boost yields, feeding more people with less land and less energy.