Hummus Made From Moon-Grown Chickpeas Might Be on the Menu for Future Lunar Residents

Researchers successfully grew and harvested chickpeas in simulated moon dirt—with a little help from worm poop and a beneficial fungus. However, they’re still testing whether the legumes are safe to eat

May 1, 2026

Left: plants growing out of strange looking dirt. Right: chickpea root covered in lunar regolith simulant — Left: Experimental setup of some chickpeas growing in artificial lunar dirt. Right: A chickpea root covered in the simulated moon soil, which is sharp and glass-like. Jessica Atkin

NASA is shooting for the moon, aiming to put humans on the lunar surface in 2028 after a 50-plus-year hiatus. This time, the agency wants to establish an enduring presence on our celestial companion.

“We will need to learn how to grow food on the moon, since it will not be sustainable to ship food in spaceships,” Sara Oliveira Santos, a fluid dynamicist at the University of Texas at Austin, tells Reuters’ Will Dunham. “It is still quite expensive to ship things to space, so weight is a factor, and … the survival of astronauts on the moon can’t be dependent on the timely shipment of supplies.”

So, Santos and her colleagues attempted—and succeeded—to grow and harvest chickpeas in an enriched lunar-dirt-like soil, which they describe in a study published in March in the journal Scientific Reports.

Not all dirt is made equal, and moon dirt, called regolith, isn’t ideal for hosting plants. It lacks the microorganisms and organic material necessary for their survival, and it contains potentially harmful heavy metals.

“It is a hazard unamended,” study co-author Jessica Atkin, a space biologist at Texas A&M University, tells Science News’ Lisa Grossman. “It is the worst. It is awful.”

The substance does, however, have nutrients and minerals crucial for plant growth, so the researchers suspected it might just need a boost from a special ingredient: worm poop.

First, the team obtained artificial moon dirt that models the makeup of Apollo lunar samples from a lab in Florida. “It is 99 percent compositionally accurate,” Atkin tells ABC News’ Julia Jacobo.

Fun fact: What about plants in real moon dirt?

Scientists recently grew thale cress—a mustard relative—in lunar regolith gathered during the Apollo missions. The experiments, described in 2022, produced the first plants grown in moon dirt.

Then, they mixed various amounts of the simulated regolith with vermicompost, a microbially diverse substance produced by red wiggler earthworms after they eat organic material. That can include mission waste, such as food scraps, cotton-based clothes and hygiene products.

Before planting, some of the chickpeas were coated with arbuscular mycorrhizae, microscopic fungi that help many plants survive—and benefit in return. The fungi absorb some nutrients from the plants while diminishing the chickpeas’ absorption of heavy metals.

These fungi “enabled plants to actually colonize Earth,” Atkin tells the Houston Chronicle’s Andrea Leinfelder. “I was asking myself, ‘Could the same mechanisms that help these plants transition from the ocean to land on Earth help us on the moon?’”

The answer seems to be yes. Dirt compositions with up to 75 percent simulated moon regolith yielded harvestable chickpeas, the team found. Any more lunar soil caused symptoms of plant stress and early plant death.

Notably, however, the stressed plants still lasted longer than chickpeas lacking fungi, hinting that the tiny partners are crucial for plant health. The team also discovered that the fungi successfully colonized and survived in the dirt mixture, indicating that in a real-world growing scenario, they would have to be added just once.

Still, no one has tasted the lunar chickpeas. The team is currently determining whether the legumes contain too much metal to be eaten.

“We want to understand their feasibility as a food source,” Atkin says in a statement. “How healthy are they? Do they have the nutrients astronauts need? If they aren’t safe to eat, how many generations until they are?”

If they turn out to be edible, she tells Science News, “I will be the first one to make some moon hummus.”

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