走，去太空烤個面包！

想想看，如果宇航員能在太空烘焙面包，也不失為一件幸福的事。對于視面包如命的德國人來說，就更是如此了。盡管困難重重，不過這樣的美夢即將實現，因為有個為宇航員著想的貼心德國人開啟了太空面包烘焙計劃。讓我們拭目以待吧！

Crumbs1） may seem harmless here on Earth， but they can be a hazard in microgravity2） — they could get in an astronaut&apos；s eye， or get inhaled3）， causing someone to choke4）. Crumbs could even float into an electrical panel， burn up5） or cause a fire.

That&apos；s part of the reason why it was a very big deal in 1965 when John Young pulled a corned beef6） sandwich out of his pocket as he was orbiting the earth with Gus Grissom.

"Where did that come from？" Grissom asked Young.

"I brought it with me，" Young said.

Young took a bite and then microgravity took over， spreading bread crumbs throughout the spacecraft.

Today， instead of bread， astronauts usually eat tortillas7）： They don&apos；t crumble in the same way and they&apos；re easy to hold with one hand as the astronaut floats about.

But for many Germans， tortillas just don&apos；t cut it8）. So when a man named Sebastian Marcu heard that German Astronaut Alexander Gerst is returning to the International Space Station in 2018， that got him thinking： "Shouldn&apos；t we do something to enable him to have fresh bread in space？"

Bread is a really big deal in Germany—there are thousands of variations of different kinds of bread there. To Marcu， a German astronaut in space without fresh bread seemed like a preventable problem.

Marcu was working in the space sector， and he and his friend， an engineer， started a company called Bake in Space in March 2017.

They&apos；re partnered with the German Aerospace Center， which is basically Germany&apos；s NASA. Their goal is to make an oven that can successfully bake dough on the International Space Station by 2018.

But there are a lot of obstacles that make baking in space difficult.

First， the oven needs to function on about a tenth of the power an oven here on earth does. And it&apos；s pretty much impossible to preheat the oven， because if it gets hot and then the door is opened， a giant hot air bubble could leave the oven and float into the spacecraft.

"It could just sit there in mid air and an astronaut could basically burn himself if he flies through it，" Marcu says.

Which is clearly not ideal.

Then there&apos；s the problem of the dough—at low heat， bread has to bake for a longer period of time， but the longer it bakes， the drier it gets. And crumbling must be avoided at all costs because of the havoc9） bread wreaks10） in space.endprint

Despite all the technical challenges， Marcu predicts that his company will be able to have Alexander Gerst bake the first loaf of bread in space next year.

"It&apos；s not just about making one German astronaut happy with fresh bread，" Marcu explains. "There&apos；s really a deeper meaning to bread in space."

He says bread is ubiquitous. It&apos；s made its way onto our dinner tables， into our religion， our slang. Breadwinner and dough stand for money， for wellbeing， for quality of life. We break bread with strangers as a gesture of good faith.

"Well， it would definitely be a big symbol of peace to break bread with an alien life form I think，" he says.

But most importantly to Marcu， freshly baked bread in space will offer astronauts a little slice of home.

在地球上，面包屑似乎并無害處，但在失重情況下，面包屑卻是危險品——它們能進入宇航員的眼里，或是被吸入口鼻引起嗆咳。面包屑甚至能飄進配電板里，燒毀配電板或引起火災。

這就是為什么在1965年，當約翰·楊和加斯·格里森在宇宙飛船上繞地航行的時候，楊從口袋中掏出一塊腌牛肉三明治是一件非常嚴峻的事情。

“這東西從哪兒弄的？”格里森問。

“我帶上來的?！睏罨卮鹫f。

楊咬了一口三明治，然后微重力就控制了一切，使面包屑飄到了宇宙飛船的各個角落。

如今，宇航員們一般不吃面包，而是吃墨西哥玉米薄餅。這種餅不像面包那樣掉屑，而且它們也利于宇航員在飄行的時候用一只手抓握。

但對很多德國人來說，墨西哥玉米薄餅并不合心意。所以，當一個名叫塞巴斯蒂安·馬庫的人聽說德國宇航員亞歷山大·格爾斯特將于2018年返回國際空間站時，他不由想到：“難道我們就不能想想辦法，讓他在太空中吃到現烤的面包？”

在德國，面包可不是件小事兒——這里有成千上萬種面包。在馬庫看來，德國宇航員在太空中吃不到現烤面包這個問題，似乎是可以避免的。

馬庫從事太空行業，他和他的一位工程師朋友在 2017年3月成立了一家名叫太空烘焙的公司?！?br>