Shrimply Delicious: A Decision Framework for Space Aquaculture Species Selection

Key obstacles to future long duration space missions include the in-situ production of sufficient proteins and nutrients for crew health, as well as the yet-unsolved challenge of closing the waste and water life support loops. Bioregenerative architectures, such as ESA’s MELiSSA, can effectively process human solid waste into clean water and nutrient effluent which is converted to microalgae biomass. Still, algae are undesirable as a primary food source and should instead be used as feed for aquaculture to meet nutritional and palatability needs and effectively close the loop. However, the strict constraints imposed on space aquaculture eliminate most common options, necessitating the consideration of less conventional species. This paper introduces a framework for comparing potential space aquaculture candidates across traits that are relevant to husbandry in the space environment, including the flexibility to optimize for specific mission scenarios by adjusting trait importance weighting. Applying this framework revealed two strong candidates for long duration missions: aquatic Pomacea snails and ephemeral shrimp of the Artemia genus.