February 19th 2019, marks the 2 year anniversary of astrobotany.com.

I’d just like to take this moment to observe some of the accomplishments we have made as a website and community since last February. I’m also going to briefly outline our focus for 2019 through early 2020.

by the numbers

This year saw 6,440 unique visitors to astrobotany.com, a 48% increase in web traffic compared to our first year.

We fell just short of lifetime 10K: we’ve had 9,757 unique visitors since the site began.

projects and collaborations of 2018-19

Carthage College Astrobiology Course

First Lego League

BTCI Outreach

Wisconsin Science Festival

Games in Astrobotany Workshop

NASA GeneLab TOAST Database

The Astrobotany Show

The Astrobotany Podcast

2019-2020 is the year of education

This year, astrobotany.com will be placing an emphasis on astrobiology education. We’ll be doing this a number of ways

we’re continuing to collaborate with educators in the Madison, WI area to perfect lesson plans to be used in classroom settings

we’re aiming to help develop coursework for 1-2 educational programs

we’re reaching out to our connections in industry and academia to bring the botany and spaceflight communities closer together to collaborate on citizen science

we’re making content that appeals to younger and non-traditional audiences using a diverse media portfolio

I’m extremely proud of how the site has grown since it first started and I’m grateful for the support we’ve received all over the globe.

As a public resource for an emerging scientific discipline, I hope astrobotany.com can set an example for how democratization of a science can be achieved through free flow of information, data accessibility, and good old fashioned graphic design.

Let’s grow plants in space.

Kai Rasmussen

P.S. Don’t hesitate to reach out.