Wouldn’t vertical farming, lab grown meat, and bug protein be required for space travel/colonization? I’m hoping that is what is behind this push.
Lab grown proteins, along with electricity to sugar or acetate is how deep space will be done. Use nuclear power to turn CO2 water nitrogen gas and inorganic minerals into the three things all monogastrics need. Carbohydrates,complete amino acids, and polylipids plus trace elements and minerals.
Humans already have the lab grown proteins down to a science, using yeasts,fungi,and bacteria, adding in synthetic animal tissues is recent the other three have been commercialized in the past and some still are. The direct process to turn CO2 into acetate was perfected just recently via electrochemical synthesis. Acetate can be feed directly to single cell plants or yeasts or bacteria or turned into glucose and feed directly to humans or used to grow cell cultures of biopsy harvested cells from cattle or avians.