How the Mars500 Crew Is Coping

With the Mars500 experiment nearing its third month mark, experts are beginning to form a clue as to how humans endure long-term space travels.

Six volunteers underwent astronaut training last years and at the beginning of 2010, and were then locked in a facility that simulates a future spacecraft bound for the Red Planet.

The goal of the experiment is to keep these people locked away for 520 days, during which time they will be placed to the exact same rigors as a Mars-bound crew would.

They only eat food stored at the beginning of the “trip,” and experience a delay in communications similar to the one they would if they moved farther away from Earth.

But what the researchers are most interested in are the psychological demands of such a long journey. Oddly enough, this is what prevents us from going to the Red Planet, and not a lack of technology.

A round-trip to our neighbor will only become possible when we can be sure that the astronauts we send there can return home in one piece, and with their minds intact.

Three Russians, two Europeans and one Chinese currently inhabit the experiment, which features several modules and a Martian simulation chamber.

The latter is an enclosure that features a landscape reproduced from data on Mars collected by orbiters and landers. The “astronauts” will spend about a month in it, Space reports.

At this point, the plan is to “travel” for a few months, then “land and explore” the Red Planet, and then spend another few months on the road back home. Such a time line would also be used in an actual mission.

“This simulated Mars mission is by far the longest-duration study of crew confinement under operating conditions attempted to date,” explains researcher David Dinges.

He is the leader of the single American study in the Mars500 project. The endeavor is a collaboration of the European Space Agency (ESA), the Russian Federal Space Agency (RosCosmos), and the China National Space Administration (CNSA).

“The autonomy and isolation of the crew will have an impact on psychological parameters,” explains Gro Sandal, who is the principal investigator of the experiment.

He is based at the University of Bergen in Norway, where he is a professor of psychology. “During a mission to Mars, the crew will not be able to rely on the same level of support from Earth as, for example, during ISS missions,” he says.

“So the crew's isolation is going to be much stronger, and this, in combination with the longer duration and lack of continuous support from Earth, will be an important aspect which will be simulated during Mars500,” he concludes.