After Idli

While astronauts get to do tons of cool stuff, their lives are hardly as glamorous as pop culture has painted them to be. Months, and sometimes years, of gruelling training aside, most of them end up facing long-term health problems. But one of the greatest sacrifices they make is all the amazing food on Earth.

Let's face it, no matter how hard researchers try, the dry, paste-like food that astronauts have to slurp out of anti-float packaging can never match up to a greasy burger.

However, times are changing, and the quality of food available to astronauts in space is slowly improving. In fact, just a few months back, ISRO chief S Somanath revealed that Indian astronauts would carry idlis with sambar powder and coconut chutney during the Gaganyaan mission.

But if dehydrated idlis are not your thing, you will be happy to know that astronauts might soon have access to some crispy, deep-fried vadas in the future.

A team of scientists at ESA recently decided to see if potatoes could be cooked to a level of edibility in microgravity and have made golden fries with a side of scientific breakthrough in the process!

Cooking in space is tricky business. To fry the potato to perfection, the oil bubbles must get pulled upwards so they don't stick to the surface of the potato. But the lack of buoyancy in space would make this difficult. Not to mention, hot oil could float out of the pan and fly right into your face.

To keep that from happening, the scientists developed a new, fully closed deep fryer. Then, they conducted two flight campaigns with a specially designed aircraft that created brief moments of weightlessness through parabolic flight manoeuvres. These flights ascended to an altitude of at least 20,000 feet and then rapidly descended, providing approximately 22 seconds of microgravity during which the potatoes were fried.

With the help of a high-speed, high-resolution camera, they captured the dynamics of the bubbles, including their growth rate, size, distribution, and escape velocity from the potato's surface. They also measured the temperature of the boiling oil and the potato's interior.

To their delight, they found that vapour bubbles detached from the potato's surface even in the absence of buoyancy during the parabolic flight, allowing the hot oil to maintain contact with the potato and ultimately result in a fried product.

This study provides vital experimental evidence that food can be fried in space. And once this technology is further developed, astronauts will have access to fried food as part of their regular diet. Not only will this enable them to maintain familiar eating habits, but it will also enhance food security during long-term missions to the Moon and Mars.

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