🌅 NASA Needs Volunteers to Simulate a Year on Mars

SOURCE

NASA

WHAT TO KNOW

• Think you’ve missed your chance to become an astronaut? Now might be your time to shine: NASA is seeking four volunteers to participate in a yearlong simulated mission to the Moon and Mars. Scheduled to begin no later than August 2027, participants will spend 12 months living and working in isolated, confined conditions at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, helping researchers understand how long-duration missions affect crew health and performance. Volunteers will grow their own food, perform spacewalks, and test various hardware and technology, all while adapting to the Martian day/night cycle (which lasts about 40 minutes longer than on Earth).

WHY IT MATTERS

• The Moon & Mars Exploration Analog mission combines elements of two existing NASA programs with the aim of mimicking future crewed missions to the Moon and Mars: HERA (Human Exploration Research Analog), to study the effects of deep-space travel, and CHAPEA (Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog), to simulate working on the Martian surface. The transit vehicle, adapted from HERA, stands two stories tall and includes facilities such as a workspace, living area, and sleeping quarters, while the surface habitat, currently used by another CHAPEA mission, is a one-story 3D-printed facility with private quarters, a communal workspace, recreation room, crop cultivation and food prep areas, and a sandbox for simulated spacewalks. Volunteers will also have access to a rover module that may be tested.

CONNECT THE DOTS

• NASA is accepting applications on an ongoing basis; however, eligibility is restricted to Americans aged 30 to 55 with “astronaut-like qualifications,” including a science or engineering background (comparable military experience also counts). The results of the mission will inform NASA’s future Moon Base and Artemis missions, and provide valuable data for the agency’s Human Research Program, which helps keep astronauts mission-ready.