Tree Houses

Add one more candidate to the list of targets for human outmigration into our solar system. Freeman Dyson, co-inventor of Project Orion, also envisioned a relatively low-cost means of establishing terrestrial-life habitat in space. It's called a Dyson Tree. Basically you plant a giant, genetically engineered tree inside the void pockets of a comet.

Cheap real-estate, just add shrubbery

The tree processes the water and carbon dioxide ice and creates oxygen, which fills the voids. Habitat is created in the voids of the comet and in hollows in the tree itself. Possibly the tree would grow out of the comet and create a stable biome under its intertwined canopy. Animals, including humans, live off of the tree, and produce soil to further nourish it, establishing a stable biome.

Outer-canopy Dyson Tree

Saint Exupéry should be proud.

Dyson also has some interesting thoughts about trees, CO2 remediation and global warming which I will be talking about here soon.

Many thanks to Shubhendu Trivedi at the awesome blog Onionesque Reality for the information on Dyson Trees, this one warrants further exploration. Trivedi is also a huge supporter of Project Orion, and has lots of cool stuff about it over at his blog.