“First of all, we grow salads and greens, but we also explore growing berries, such as blueberry and raspberry, as well as strawberry,” says Professor Ivan Tarakanov, who is in charge of the artificial climate lab at the Timiryazev Academy. “With the appearance of LED lighting we have got a powerful tool that helps us to control the plant’s green mass gain and the synthesis of target functional characteristics, which is important for medicinal herbs, for instance.”
“The parts and components are mixed – we are using Chinese LED crystals at the moment, but LED lamps are Russian-made,” Ivan Tarakanov told Sputnik. “But the key thing is that we have domestic software here, which solves the problem of buying expensive foreign software, as the latter is nearly impossible under sanctions. We also have a interdisciplinary approach, so besides agriculture experts we also have IT specialists from the Bauman State Technical University working with us.”
“The Arctic is a whole other world, and creating technologies to grow plants in closed circuit farms, in vertical farms - is something which is definitely a breakthrough. These are the projects that we are proud to showcase to the media today.”