Chapter 6 The Evolved Lychee Tree

Mars has almost no magnetic field, and its atmosphere contains 95.97% carbon dioxide. It is basically difficult for Earth's plants to survive here.

Plants need water and access to a variety of nutrients, as well as a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen, carbon (in various forms), and other "air components" to thrive. Plus a stable range of light waves (from different spectrums) and relatively stable temperatures to promote photosynthesis and reproduction.

The soil on Mars contains a lot of toxic substances and does not have the nutrients needed by plants.

Also, the atmospheric pressure on Mars is less than 2.3 percent of Earth's sea level pressure, and the temperature, so any plant you put on the surface of Mars is going to suffocate, and of course it's probably going to suffer from a lot of cell damage first Death from rupture and dehydration from loss of pressure.

Therefore, under normal circumstances, if you want to grow plants on Mars, you need to build a Mars farm that is isolated from the Martian air and pressurized, just like what the male protagonist Mark Watney does in his habitat.

However, the [Vitality Tree] that Wu Siyuan took out was not an ordinary plant.

Its body glowed with faint fluorescence, resisting the pressure of Mars and surviving tenaciously.

If botanists on earth saw it, they would definitely exclaim that this is a miracle of life.

The person who created this miracle was using a rover to drag a dusty and sandy machine back to the habitat cabin.

This is the thirtieth day since Wu Siyuan came to this world.

It is also the forty-eighth day that the male protagonist Mark Watney has stayed on Mars.

This dusty and sandy machine was the Mars probe that successfully landed on July 4, 1997. It was the first human rover to land on Mars in the true sense - Pathfinder!

Mars Pathfinder consists of the orbiter, lander and Sojourner rover.

The total weight is 800 kilograms, of which the lander weighs 264 kilograms.

The Sojourner Mars rover is a 6-wheel vehicle with a length of 0.66 meters, a width of 0.48 meters, a height of 0.30 meters, and a weight of 11.5 kilograms.

It carries a camera.

Its final transmission of data to Earth came on September 27, 1997, by which time Sojourner had been on Mars for nearly four months—12 times its design lifetime.

Finally, it was covered by the wind and sand of Mars in the Ashidaria Plain.

In the original movie, the male protagonist Mark Watney dug it out and then made contact with the earth.

Wu Siyuan will also get in touch with the earth, but not now, so after he brought the rover back, he threw it aside and headed for the entrance of the lava tube one kilometer away.

An hour.

Wu Siyuan came to the underground space.

The three [Vitality Trees] are growing prosperously.

Each one is at least thirty or forty meters tall.

A canopy of white leaves almost covers the entire top of the underground space.

[Vitality Sub-Tree] absorbs sunlight and carbon dioxide, performs special reactions, and releases vitality and oxygen.

Although wearing a spacesuit, Wu Siyuan could feel that the composition of the air in the entire underground space had changed.

The proportion of oxygen has increased, and the proportion of carbon dioxide has decreased.

However, the air pressure does not change much.

Therefore, people on earth still cannot breathe the air here freely.

Wu Siyuan stroked the trunk of the [Yuanqizi Tree] with his hand, and his spirit continued to spread down the trunk. He saw the intricate roots under the soil, piercing deeply into the rock, extending down thousands of meters, and inserting into the water deep in Mars. In his veins, he frantically absorbs salt water and transforms it into his own source of life.

He immediately understood that in the next year, he no longer needed to worry about the survival of these three [Vitality Trees].

Of course, Wu Siyuan also knew that it was impossible to rely on these three [Vitality Trees] to completely change the environment of Mars and make it suitable for human survival on Earth.

Of course, this is not the purpose of Wu Siyuan.

Because there is enough vitality content in the underground space, it basically meets the growth conditions of [Li Ping Tree].

Wu Siyuan took out the seeds of the [Liping Tree] from the [Shennongjiao Space], dropped his fingers into the fertile Martian soil, and then took out a drop of the [Fountain of Life] and dropped it on it.

Immediately, the [Li Ping Tree] took root and sprouted, growing into a large bottle tree seven or eight meters high at a speed visible to the naked eye. It bloomed but had no fruit. Then it soon couldn't withstand the low pressure of Mars, lost water, and directly Withered, lost vitality.

Wu Siyuan was stunned for a moment, and then realized the problem.

Because there are no insects such as bees for pollination, the [Li Ping Tree] can only bloom but cannot bear fruit.

Wu Siyuan, who wanted to understand this, disposed of the withered [Li Ping Tree], took out the seeds of the [Li Ping Tree] from the [Shen Nongjiao Space] again, and used the [Fountain of Life].

Another large bottle tree is growing and blooming at a speed visible to the naked eye.

It was at this moment that Wu Siyuan, who had been prepared for a long time, used his mental power to start artificial pollination.

This speed is very fast.

In just a few seconds, the [Li Ping Tree] grew black fruits.

Not long after, the effectiveness of the [Fountain of Life] dissipated, and the [Li Ping Tree] was once again rendered lifeless by the low pressure of Mars.

Wu Siyuan was not discouraged and continued to plant seeds from the fruits of the [Li Ping Tree] grown on Mars, watered them with the [Fountain of Life], artificially pollinated them, and harvested the fruits.

Wu Siyuan repeated this operation again and again, ten times, twenty times, fifty times... as if he was a robot that didn't know how to get tired.

Yes, Wu Siyuan took advantage of the evolutionary instinct of plants to adapt to the environment, and used the [Fountain of Life] to shorten the evolution time tens of millions of times, and achieve evolutionary results that would have taken tens of millions of years in history.

Wu Siyuan wants to cultivate a plant suitable for the low-pressure environment of Mars.

[Vitality Sub-Tree] This kind of thing doesn’t count.

This is not an easy thing to do.

Wu Siyuan worked hard all day but failed. He calmly returned to the habitat cabin to rest.

Continue the next day.

Continue on the third day.

The fourth day...

Until the sixth day.

The thirty-sixth day that Wu Siyuan came to this world.

It is also the fifty-fourth day that the male protagonist Mark Watney has stayed on Mars.

A low, pot-bellied bottle tree with loose spongy leaves appeared in front of Wu Siyuan. Its roots penetrated into the roots of the [Yuanqi subtree] and obtained the nutrients needed for growth from it.

Although there are still many limitations, this is indeed a landmark achievement——

A plant that can grow in the Martian environment!

Wu Siyuan couldn't help but raise the corners of his mouth. He collected a large number of seeds of this evolved [Li Ping Tree], planted them in every corner of the underground space, and then dripped [Fountain of Life].

One after another [Li Ping Tree] rises from the ground and grows into a pot-bellied bottle tree only two or three meters high.

"The bait is ready! It's time to put it into the fish pond!" Wu Siyuan's eyes turned to the Mars rover outside the habitat cabin.

At this time, someone on Earth also discovered anomalies on Mars!