Scientists develop a living building material for Mars using engineered yeast

Scientists have developed a living building material designed for construction on Mars, combining inert sand with a gelatin-based hydrogel and engineered yeast cells. According to the research published in Chem Circularity titled ‘Engineered living building material for low-energy construction on Mars’, the material can be processed and printed under simulated Martian conditions while requiring far less processing energy than conventional regolith sintering, which involves heating mineral material to temperatures above 1,000°C. In recycling experiments, crushed material from existing bricks was used to produce new bricks while retaining mechanical performance and yeast viability. The findings point to a potential route for lower-energy, reusable construction materials for future Mars missions.How scientists developed a living Mars building material using engineered yeastResearchers developed a Martian living building material, or MLBM, using inert sand and a water-based gelatin and engineered-yeast hydrogel binder. In tests, the mixture was first set under ambient conditions before being freeze-dried at −55°C and 0.0001 atm for 48 hours. As the process progressed, the water froze a...