alt Hacker NewsWhy this ISSpresso machine was developed and sent into orbit at all? What scientific outcome does it have? Why was it necessary spending taxpayer's money developing it?
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Astronauts can spend many months on the ISS, and it’s very important they don’t become irritable and kill one another before the research is complete.
The article assumes single digit million as cost. That is a drop in the water when it comes to cost of running ISS.
Additionally the technical paper claims psychological benefits for humans to have something familiar in a harsh and unfamiliar environment. Which will also come in handy for when humans travel beyond LEO.
To quote the official paper:
> The food system for long-duration space missions not only provides nutrition to the crew, but it also provides a form of psychological support by providing a familiar element in an unfamiliar and hostile environment
Because, Espresso is a life elixer?
But seriously. As the article says, there are other needs for having high pressure hot water. The learnings from this can be used elsewhere.
As the siblings said, it can also have been paid for by Lavazza. Aside of the marketing value now, imagine securing the right/first mover advantage to make all coffee makers into the foreseeable future? Speaking of barrier to entry. ;-)
Are you sure Lavazza didn't eat the cost? It's great marketing material for them.
This could be similar to the fisher space pen. There's a common urban legend that NASA spent millions developing the space pen, while the soviets simply used pencils. Fisher actually paid for the development of the space pen.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing_in_space