14 DAY TRIAL // According to a new proposition by experts at NASA, corporate partners could help an upcoming mission to Mars by sponsoring the construction of a spacecraft and the training of a crew to go there.
A human mission to the Red Planet is one of the main goals in space exploration today, and the really interesting thing is that the problems preventing us from going there are strictly financial.
In other words, we have the desire, the will and the technology to embark on this groundbreaking trip, but no money to do it with. The cost of sending humans to Mars is estimated to be about $160 billion.
The American space agency could never hope to muster up this huge amount of money, so it proposes that corporate partners be put in the loop. If their plan materializes, then astronauts could descend on Mars from a spacecraft called Microsoft Explorer or Google Search Engine.
The exorbitant amount of money needed for exploring our neighboring planet also includes the costs associated with setting up a permanent colony there. Understandably, governments will never be able to get the type of resources they need to support such a plan, even if they decide to work together.
In the $160 billion price tag, NASA scientists included the spacecraft phase, tests associated with determining the medical health and psychological issues of a future crew, the creation of a Martian outpost, as well as the colonization of the planet, explains Joel Levine.
The expert holds an appointment as a senior research scientist at the NASA Langley Research Center. The facility plays a crucial role in approving the use of manned spacecraft outside Earth's atmosphere.
One possible avenue for getting the mission funds could be the licensing of toys, games, books, movies, clothing lines, and broadcasting rights. Selling land and potential mineral resources on Mars could also help generate the funds.
“The solution is marketing, merchandising, and corporate sponsorships, which is something NASA has never done before. It's a whole new economic plan for financing a journey to Mars and what will become the greatest adventure in the history of the human race,” Levine argues.
Additionally, the aerospace industry and manufacturing sector could receive a tremendous boost from such an endeavor. Over 10 years, the country could create up to 500,000 new jobs in the two industries, Space reports.
“A mission to Mars would motivate millions of students to pursue careers in science and technology, thereby providing corporate America with a huge talent pool of tech-savvy young scientists,” explains Rudy Schild.
“Then there are the scientific and technological advances which would directly benefit the American people. Cell phones, GPS devices and satellite TV owe their existence to the space programs of the 1960s,” the expert adds.
“The technologies which might be invented in support of a human mission to Mars stagger the imagination,” concludes Schild, an expert at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA).