In The Karman Garden: Pakistani Wheat from Mahhad Nayyer

This is the first installment in a four-part series, The Karman Garden, spotlighting the four Karman Community members who are providing seeds for the World Seeds Payload as part of the Karman-Jaguar Earth Seeds for Space partnership. Read more about the partnership here.

2024 Karman Pioneer Mahhad Nayyer is himself no stranger to trailblazing paths in space research, but through the Karman-Jaguar Earth Seeds for Space partnership, he takes it to another level: sending the first payload representing Pakistan to the International Space Station (ISS).

Mahhad, an aerospace and systems engineer pursuing his PhD at Purdue University, describes the opportunity as “quite literally, a dream come true.” In 2020, he came across a research paper featuring a world map of countries that had participated in research or education initiatives with the ISS. One conspicuous gap stood out: Pakistan, his home country of over 240 million people, was the only one of the world’s ten most populous countries not to have taken part. The image stayed with him, not out of national pride, but because of the collective failure to include millions of students and young people in humanity’s greatest adventure. He resolved to change this, and bring to life the idea that space should be accessible and meaningful for everyone, not just a select few nations or industries.

As groundbreaking as the mission is, the payload itself may seem simple at first glance: wheat seeds. Mahhad emphasizes that wheat, being the world’s most widely grown and consumed grain, serves as a bridge between nations. In Pakistan, a country heavily reliant on its agricultural sector, wheat is a staple crop. While wheat has been studied in space before, this experiment focuses on a variety native to South Asia, cultivated in different climatic and soil conditions. For Mahhad and Muhammad Haroon, his collaborator at the Purdue University Department of Botany and Plant Pathology, this opens the door to valuable comparative insights into genetic resilience and environmental adaptation under extreme conditions.

The scientific objective of the payload is to systematically observe the effects of microgravity on seed behavior, including germination rates, structural changes, and potential adaptive traits. This knowledge will inform future efforts to edit specific genes and develop cultivars that are better suited for growth in space or other extreme environments. Additionally, Mahhad and his collaborator expect to analyze physiological parameters of the seeds to assess how structural changes might affect water transport and gas exchange under non-terrestrial conditions.

For Mahhad, the true lasting impact happens after reentry. Working with a staple food for millions of Pakistanis creates a rare opportunity: a chance to connect space exploration with everyday life in a way that feels personal and tangible. It invites young people to look beyond the horizon and discover a previously obscured connection between their heritage crops and outer space. Key to the vision is that young Pakistanis can understand space not just as something involving rockets and astronauts, but rather as something rooted in their stories, experiments, and ideas. As Mahhad says, it “opens a doorway to curiosity, pride, and possibility.” He plans to coordinate with local schools, agricultural universities, science and technology parks, and outreach programs to turn this story into a conversation starter, ultimately encouraging more experiments from Pakistan in space and promoting STEAM education.

Mahhad hopes that the places of the seeds’ origin across the globe experience a multiplier effect: one that ingrains in people that they are not merely observers of space, but active contributors. In his words, he hopes the mission is “remembered as a gentle but lasting turning point: a moment when space became a little more accessible, a little more culturally grounded, and a lot more inclusive.” He keenly recognizes that it reflects the strength of The Karman Project in investing in people and interpersonal relationships, driven by the core belief that unconventional stories and global diversity can meaningfully shape space’s future: “You don’t need to launch a rocket to move the world, you just need to plant the right seed.”

The wheat seeds representing Pakistan, provided by Mahhad Nayyer, are scheduled to fly to the ISS with Crew-11 on July 31st and return with Crew-10 in August.