It’s Aaron Persad’s job to help keep astronauts nourished in space.

What You Need To Know

  • Boeing astronauts, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore can’t make it home for the holidays, but the pair will join others in celebrating Thanksgiving in space

  • Aaron Persad is an assistant professor at the University of Maryland and collaborates with space agencies to help keep space travelers satisfied and healthy

  • Persad said the holiday food gives astronauts like Williams a to enjoy food outside of their usual menu options

“I work with astronauts from NASA, from the European Space Agency and also from the Canadian Space Agency, to better understand how these different space agencies approach the question of how to feed the astronauts and keep them happy in space.”

He is an assistant professor in the Department of Engineering and Aviation at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. Outside of the classroom, he also serves as the director of bioastronautics at the International Institute for Astronautical Sciences and is the cofounder of Astreas – a space food company. 

“My role with the space food system is looking at the question of menu fatigue,” Persad said. “So this is the idea that astronauts have a selection of foods that they can choose from, things that they would like to eat in space.” 

This Thanksgiving, he’s helping astronauts get a taste of tradition.

“Typically you’ll have like … smoked turkey, candied yams, green beans and mushrooms, cornbread dressing, cranberry apple dessert, ham, [and] macaroni and cheese,” Persad said.

He said these dishes are likely better than they look.

“The difference between all of these items that you would typically have on your table for Thanksgiving versus the astronauts is this aspect of the food having to be rehydrated,” he said. “So basically, all of these elements, except perhaps the cornbread… will be this mushy, type of texture.”

It can cost between $2,000 to $10,000 to ship a pound of food into outerspace, Persad said, and NASA sends around 3.8 pounds of food for each astronaut per day. 

“You want to make that food as light as possible, so one of the ways to do that is to get rid of the water,” he said. “…What that means is you're removing the water content, and you're doing that by freezing the food and then lowering the pressure.”

In the last month, there’s been a lot of talk on social media about whether Suni Williams, who was born and raised in Euclid, Ohio, is losing weight. Williams said her weight hasn’t changed and that the fluids in her body are distributed differently in zero gravity.

Pesaid said its inevitable for astronauts to see physical changes while in space, and he and his team work hard to meet their nutritional needs despite the vast distance.

“So you've got bone remodeling usually resulting in a lower bone density, and you get muscle atrophy," he said. "The other change that happens is that your, your spinal column sort of extends a bit, so you get a little taller when you, when you are in space."

Still, the holidays give space travelers a chance for a special meal and a much-needed break from their daily diet.

“So Thanksgiving, Easter, Christmas meals, the astronauts will have these meals prepared on the ground at the Space Food Lab and then launched on a resupply cargo, and they get this and this breaks the menu fatigue,” Persad said. ”So I'm sure the astronauts look forward to this on the menu for Thanksgiving.”

Correction: This story previously misspelled the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. This has been corrected. (Nov. 26, 2024)