What is required to make a Dyson Tree a feasible space habitat?

Inspired by this question about a fantasy World Tree, I thought I'd ask about the science fiction equivalent: a Dyson Tree. Dyson Trees are a living tree planted in a comet, which when fully grown is used as a space habitat.

The Terracide RPG includes Dyson Trees as part of the setting. They sound really cool in a visual and artistic sense, but my zoologist instincts are telling me that trees aren't really designed to live in hard vacuum! For instance, to me a tree's leaves look like flat, thin structures almost designed to radiate away heat and freeze solid, which won't do the tree any good at all. To me a Dyson Saguaro Cactus seems a better shape!

However, my botany is minimal, so perhaps I'm missing something that Freeman Dyson thought of (I can't track down his original description of Dyson Trees, so can't check).

Is there any way to make Dyson Trees realistic enough to fit in with the rest of the (relatively hard sf) Terracide setting? What features would you have to genetically engineer into them? Why would someone choose to live in a space tree instead of a space station or asteroid colony (apart from for aesthetic reasons)?

posted over 8 years ago

DrBob‭

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