Discoveries

February 28, 2024

Calling For Applications!

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NASA is seeking adventurous volunteers for a year-long simulation of life on Mars, set to take place in spring 2025, Gizmodo reported.

The CHAPEA (Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog) project will see a four-person crew living in a Mars-like habitat at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. The habitat, called Mars Dune Alpha, is equipped with living quarters, a kitchen, workspaces, and recreational areas.

The deadline for applications is April 2.

To qualify, applicants must be healthy, non-smoking US citizens or permanent residents between the ages of 30 and 55. They must carry a master’s degree in a STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) field and relevant professional experience, or 1,000 hours of piloting experience.

But the simulation will not be a walk in the park: The aspiring Martians will undertake various tasks mimicking a Mars mission, including spacewalks, habitat maintenance, and crop growth, while facing communication delays with ground control.

The CHAPEA project aims to study the physical and mental challenges of long-duration space travel, which is crucial for NASA’s future missions to send humans to Mars.

The first crew of volunteers entered the habitat in 2023, providing insights into daily life in a Mars-like environment.

The agency’s ultimate goal is to establish a human presence on the Red Planet, but it first must determine the psychological and physiological impacts of such missions.

A recent paper suggested that it may only take 22 people to maintain a colony on Mars. Still, these inhabitants should have agreeable personalities to better ensure survival on our inhospitable neighboring planet.

This story originally appeared in the February 28, 2024 newsletter, Kua takoto te Mānuka.