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My name is Gioia Massa and I am a plant scientist working at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. 

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I'm currently working on experiments on the International Space Station trying to figure out the best ways to grow different crops 

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to feed the astronauts. I had a number of wonderful inspirations starting when I was 12 years old.  

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I had an agriculture class and my agriculture teacher got invited to Kennedy Space Center  

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and he brought back hours and hours of video about the research going on for growing plants for space  

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and how we can use biology to support humans in space exploration. I got my love for plants from  

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my mother and my grandmother and I think that's really given me a lot of the knowledge that I draw on  

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for work, but also the encouragement and support to do the things that I love to do.  

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One exciting thing that I got to do as a NASA scientist was to help First Lady Michelle Obama plant the White

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House kitchen garden. This was a program that she started in 2016 to get students excited about  

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growing and eating fresh vegetables. We worked with the White House to grow some of the vegetables  

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that we were growing on the International Space Station. When we think about all the roles that  

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plants play on Earth -- providing food and oxygen, and helping to recycle our water, providing fabric  

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and medicine and shelter and fuel -- all of those roles are also going to be important when we leave Earth.

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And almost everybody likes to eat and food is so important and fundamental to our life.  

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And having that little piece of Earth with you -- that green growing plant -- can be so important.  

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A lot of the books that I read are science fiction, so I can pull from science fiction and help me  

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solve some of the problems that I'm working on. I think plants are amazing because we can use them  

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to bring humans to locations like the Moon or Mars. And for me this is the biggest motivation.

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