Want To Pretend To Live On Mars? This May Be Your Mission

Would you be able to live on Mars for a year? Or, at the very least, could you play along?

NASA is looking for four individuals to live in a 1,700-square-foot habitat at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, that was built using a 3D printer to mimic a year on Mars.

Applications to join the crew will be accepted until Sept. 17, 2021, for a one-year mission that will begin in late 2022.

Finalists will be subjected to medical exams, psychological testing, and psychiatric screening, according to NASA’s website, in order to evaluate their fitness for the physically and emotionally challenging isolation mission.

“The CHAPEA missions are meant to collect essential health and performance data in order to evaluate hazards associated with traveling to Mars,” said Shaneequa Vereen, public affairs officer for NASA Johnson Space Center’s Human Health and Performance Directorate. “These analog missions will face many of the same problems as a Mars trip, including a Mars-realistic spaceflight food system, time-delayed communication, crew isolation and confinement, and resource constraints,” according to NASA.

NASA, on the other hand, isn’t seeking for just anyone to join them on this trip. Applicants must have a Master’s degree in a science, engineering, or math discipline, as well as pilot experience, to be considered.

Furthermore, only citizens of the United States between the ages of 30 and 55 who do not have any nutritional or physical health concerns will be eligible. Do you have motion sickness when you travel? Sorry, but there is nothing that can be done.

“Living on Mars will present a variety of difficulties,” Vereen noted. “We are able to collect data that allows us to properly evaluate hazards before sending people all the way to Mars by undertaking analog missions.”

The Mars Dune Alpha experiment will be conducted in three stages, the first of which will begin next autumn. Spacewalks and ready-to-eat space meals will be included in the exploration expedition. There will even be a garden area where plants and other vegetation may be grown.