Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Emerging Tech
  3. News

You can help NASA plan for Mars by playing astronaut in Hawaii

Les Shu
By
university of hawaii long term space exploration program hiseas 1
Life on Mars, by way of Hawaii. You, too, can be here if you're chosen to participate in a new space-exploration program conducted by the University of Hawaii at Mānoa. Image used with permission by copyright holder

If you aren’t an astronaut or your name isn’t Elon Musk, Richard Branson, or “insert bazillionaire’s name here,” the chances of you traveling into outer space are pretty much zilch. While commercial space travel is imminent, it’ll be many decades before the hoi polloi can afford to travel in zero gravity. So as an alternative, you could head over to Hawaii and experience what long-term space travel would be like.

According to Jaunted, the University of Hawaii at Mānoa is looking for volunteers to participate in a series of space-exploration studies that will provide NASA the “essential information needed for long-duration space exploration missions,” like those to Mars one day. The studies will take place at the Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation (HI-SEAS) site, an isolated Mars-like environment 8,200 feet above sea level, on the slopes of Mauna Loa on the Big Island. Volunteers will live in the same habitat that was part of a NASA-funded Mars food study. 

Recommended Videos

The research, says the University, aims to “test a hypothesis that group cohesion over the short term predicts team performance over the long term; observe how technical, social, and task roles evolve over long-duration missions; and establish baselines for a wide range of human cognitive, social, and emotional factors over missions of varying durations.”

Related

Ready to sign up? The program is seeking a diverse age group between 21 and 65. However, applicants must be nonsmokers, be able to pass a flight physical exam, and communicate in English fluently. There are also some additional strict requirements per NASA that includes things like having an undergrad degree in science or engineering, or three years of experience or graduate study, etc. If chosen, the volunteer will be compensated, plus room and board.

If you’re interested, you only have until November 1, 2013 to register. Click here to find out more about the application process. And, even though it may not be real space, at least you’ll get to live in Hawaii for a while.

(Image via Angelo Vermeulen/HI-SEAS)

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Les Shu
Les Shu
Former Digital Trends Contributor
I am formerly a senior editor at Digital Trends. I bring with me more than a decade of tech and lifestyle journalism…
NASA wants your help to design an avoidance sensor for a Venus rover
An illustration of a concept for a possible wind-powered Venus rover.

An illustration of a concept for a possible wind-powered Venus rover. NASA/JPL-Caltech

NASA is looking to members of the public to design an avoidance sensor for obstacle courses that could be used for a future Venus rover. Despite being our planetary neighbor, few missions have ever landed on Venus because of its scorchingly high surface temperatures of up to 900 degrees Fahrenheit, as well as surface pressure 90 times that of Earth which is strong enough to turn lead into a puddle.

Read more
NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is taking a two-week vacation
This artist's concept shows NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter over the red planet.

Rovers like Curiosity and the upcoming Mars 2020 might get the most attention, but spacecraft in orbit around the planet play a vital role in scientific investigations of Mars as well. One of the busiest has been NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), which launched in 2005 and arrived at the red planet to begin investigations in 2006. Since then, it has sent back to Earth over 371 terabits of data.

Now, the MRO is taking a short break, going on an almost two-week hiatus from its science mission for maintenance to be performed. "The maintenance work involves updating battery parameters in the spacecraft's flash memory -- a rare step that has been done only twice before in the orbiter's 15 years of flight," NASA explained in a blog post. "This special update is necessary because it was recently determined that the battery parameters in flash were out of date and if used, would not charge MRO's batteries to the desired levels."

Read more
NASA’s newest Deep Space Network antenna will receive laser signals from Mars
Deep Space Network This artist's concept shows what Deep Space Station-23, a new antenna dish capable of supporting both radio wave and laser communications, will look like when completed at the Deep Space Network's Goldstone, California, complex.

This artist's concept shows what Deep Space Station-23, a new antenna dish capable of supporting both radio wave and laser communications, will look like when completed at the Deep Space Network's Goldstone, California, complex. NASA/JPL-Caltech

In order to communicate with spacecraft traveling millions of miles out into space, you need a very powerful communication system. You need something like NASA's Deep Space Network (DSN), a worldwide array of radio antennas which form the largest telecommunications system in the world. And with planned missions to Mars requiring even greater communications sensitivity, the Deep Space Network is getting an upgrade.

Read more