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Welcome to a special Valentine’s edition of Gardeners off World, where love is definitely in the recycled air!

The Veggie vegetable production system launched to the International Space Station (ISS) in April 2014. After growing two crops of ‘Outredgeous’ space lettuce, it’s next mission (VEG-01C) was to grow a bunch of flowers: the seeds chosen were a five-colour mix of Zinnia ‘Profusion’. Although they hit some problems along the way, Space Gardener Scott Kelly coaxed them into flowering in time for Valentine’s Day 2016:

If you’re in need of a last-minute Valentine’s card – NASA has got you covered! There are Celestial Valentine’s images on their Tumblr you can steal, a galaxy of romantic ecards to send, and even a few printable space Valentines.

“Blue and red wavelengths are the minimum needed to get good plant growth,” Wheeler said. “They are probably the most efficient in terms of electrical power conversion. The green LEDs help to enhance the human visual perception of the plants, but they don’t put out as much light as the reds and blues.”

Would a rose in space still smell as sweet? That was the question International Flavors and Fragrances (IFF), Inc., of New York, set out to answer in October 1998. They partnered with the Wisconsin Center for Space Automation and Robotics (WCSAR) to modify the ASTROCULTURE (TM) commercial plant research facility to incorporate IFF’s proprietary technology for sampling and analysing essential oils.

They then used it fly a miniature rose (“Overnight Scentsation”) onSpace Shuttle Discovery flight STS-95. Now, this was a fairly special flight for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it returned Mercury astronaut John Glenn to space. Glenn went from being the first American to orbit the Earth