Chemical Gardens (CG)

Chemical Gardens (CG) was an investigation to compare Chemical Garden structures grown in microgravity to those grown on Earth using systematic measurements of key physical characteristics such as morphology, tube radii, and growth dynamics. CG was proposed to a NASA internal call “Four Crew Research Solicitation”. It was a quick, simple burst pouch experiment executed within a new disposable glovebag on the Maintenance Work Area (MWA) requiring very little crew time or other expense.

Chemical Gardens are inorganic structures formed from self-organization and reaction-precipitation systems that result when a variety of metal salts are placed into a basic, anionic, solution. The precipitation structures, which exhibit a plant-like morphology, can take many forms ranging from large hollow bulbs to long thin tubes. These chemical systems maintain chemical and electrochemical disequilibria similar to rudimentary biological processes, and if we can fully understand these systems, new technological advances in self-assembly and self-organization can be realized.

Results from the samples grown on ISS in July of 2018 show that these structures are slow growing and exhibit unique morphologies, such as surface striations and plastic deformation. Moreover, there is some evidence for bubble-guided growth mechanisms similar to that found on Earth. Furthermore, chemical gardens grown in microgravity had tubes that varied in height from ~1 mm to ~5 mm and wall thickness from ~0.5 µm to 3.3 µm. Our results will give us further insight into these chemical systems, allowing us to tailor them to specific applications.

Chemical Gardens investigation will Increase understanding of the physics of nanotube growth in chemical gardens and obtain important information as to how micro-structures can be engineered from self-organizing chemical reactions. This improved understanding will enable development of a new engineering approach to create hierarchically structured materials and even simple devices by biomimetic, parallel growth rather than sequential processing steps.

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