Dumping it on the moon's surface is not an option, so the space agency entered into an agreement with UF* for ideas. Pullammanappallil and then-graduate student Abhishek Dhoble accepted the challenge.

"We were trying to find out how much methane can be produced from uneaten food, food packaging and human waste," said Pullammanappallil, a UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences faculty member and Dhoble's adviser. "The idea was to see whether we could make enough fuel to launch rockets and not carry all the fuel and its weight from Earth for the return journey. Methane can be used to fuel the rockets. Enough methane can be produced to come back from the moon."

*University of Florida

Waste not want not, right Geege?