NASA Offered 1m to People Who Can Come Up With Innovative Systems, Not Easy-To-Pack Foods
The Claim
NASA announced it’s offering $1m to anyone that can come up with [ideas for] food that’s easy to pack.
Emerging story
Facebook accounts have recently shared alleged news that NASA announced it’s offering 1 million dollars to anyone that can come up with [ideas for] food that’s easy to pack.
Misbar’s Analysis
Misbar’s team investigated the claim and found it selective. NASA did not announce that it would award a million dollars to anyone who manages to find an innovative solution to make easy-to-pack food. Instead, NASA announced on Jan. 20 that it would award 1 million dollars, in collaboration with the Canadian Space Agency, for the team that wins the Centennial Challenges program, with the last initiative based on a multi-phase competition among teams to develop innovative and sustainable food systems for astronauts.
The competition is dubbed the Deep Space Food Challenge, the first phase of which took place in Oct. 2021, with 18 teams taking part. Two prizes were awarded by the Methuselah Foundation, NASA’s partner in this challenge. The value of the prize was $25,000, while the Canadian Space Agency offered $30,000 to 10 teams.
Most recently, NASA announced the start of the second phase of the competition, which will have a total prize of 1 million dollars.
The competition is not limited to the production of easy-to-pack food but rather the innovation of integrated food systems or technologies, including production, processing, transportation, consumption, and waste disposal. These systems help complete a crew of four astronauts for a three-year space mission.
Translated by Ahmed N. A. Almassri
