Scientific American Guest Blog #2–Dragos Zaharescu

Dragos Zaharescu, Ph.D. tastes ground rock used in his plant medium. Photograph by Susan E. Swanberg.

With a mischievous grin and gleaming dark eyes, Dr. Dragos Zaharescu raises a small spatula to his lips and tastes. At his feet are four containers, each filled with a different type of ground rock—granite, basalt, rhyolite or schist. Zaharescu will blend this rock with bacteria or fungus, creating a sandy medium for seedlings he grows here under the glass dome of Biosphere 2.

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2012/12/11/rock-tasting-at-biosphere-2/