First seeds to germinate on the Moon

The first seeds to germinate on the Moon were some cotton seeds (genus Gossypium) that sprouted on 7 January 2019, having been taken there inside China's Chang'e-4 lander as part of an on-board biosphere experiment to help prepare for eventual human lunar settlements. By 13 January, however, i.e., less than a week later, the sprouting cotton plants had died, having succumbed to freezing temperatures that plunged to -52°C (-61.6°F) during the lunar night-time. Nevertheless, photos of them while still alive had been sent back to Earth from Chang'e-4, confirming their brief survival. The lander had made a soft landing on the Moon's far side on 3 January 2019, the first craft ever to do so.

The biosphere experiment had been conducted by researchers and students at Chongqing University in central China. As well as the cotton seeds, it had also included oilseed rape, potato and rockcress (arabidopsis) seeds, plus yeast and fruit flies, maintained in a sealed growing chamber in the hope that they would thrive and create a self-sustaining artificial mini-biosphere, but only the cotton seeds sprouted. The experiment – which did not use batteries – consisted of the canister, the six species, water, soil, air, two small cameras and a heat control system, and it ran for a total of 212.75 hours. Because they were inside the sealed canister, they did not contaminate the lunar surface, dying and gradually decomposing while still inside the canister.