On January 8 of this year, astronaut Scott Kelly tweeted a photo of an alien-like green-leafed stem with the caption, “Some of my space flowers are on the rebound! No longer looking sad! #YearInSpace” Naturally, the tweet received a lot of attention with followers eagerly anticipating the first photo of a full bloom flower that had been grown in space.
Come January 16th, the wait was over. From the International Space Station, Kelly tweeted the first photo of this out of our world flower. Grown in zero gravity, this stunningly vibrant flower is the first of its kind- a morale-boosting plant that is anticipated to enhance the isolating environment the astronauts have to live in.