Cosmic Space Plants: Plants4Space (Primary 3 – 6) (Melbourne)

Cosmic Space Plants – Plants 4 Space

Join the University of Melbourne outreach team from the Australian Research Centre of Excellence Plants4Space for an exciting hands-on primary science years 3-6 workshop. This workshop explores food, nutrition and plant science in the context of space travel. In this interactive session, participants will investigate how astronauts eat, why food tastes different in space, and designing the best meals to keep astronauts healthy on long missions to places like Mars.

Using the Space Salad Workbook, participants will:

• Explore what happens to the human body in microgravity
  
• Conduct a taste experiment to discover how smell and sight affect flavour
  
• Investigate the importance of proteins, fats, carbohydrates and fibre for astronaut health
  
• Design and test their own “space salad” meal using simple biochemical tests

The session connects space exploration, nutrition science and plant biology, showing how plants may support future astronauts by providing food, oxygen and sustainable life-support systems. Hurry, space is limited to 30 participants per session.

Two sessions: Thursday 16 July 2026
10.30am – 12pm | 1.00pm to 2.30pm

LOCATION: Level 3, Redmond Barry Building 115, The University of Melbourne, Victoria 3010 Australia

CONTACT / BOOKINGS: Dr Janine Oldfield | oldfieldj@unimelb.edu.au