As expectations grow around humanity’s return to the Moon through NASA’s Artemis missions, the agency is working, in parallel, on a subsequent, even bolder project: taking astronauts to Mars by 2040.
While this doesn’t actually happen, some simulated manned missions are underway here on Earth, in environments that faithfully reproduce the conditions of the Red Planet.
Recently, NASA announced four volunteers to spend 45 days in an immersive experience in a Mars-like habitat installed at the Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Jason Lee, Stephanie Navarro, Shareef Al Romaithi and Piyumi Wijesekara will live and work at HERA (acronym in English for Analog Human Exploration Research) between May 10th and June 24th. Two alternate crew members were also selected for the mission: Jose Baca and Brandon Kent. Find out more about them below.
This mission is part of NASA’s Human Research Program (HRP), which investigates the best ways to keep humans safe while traveling in space.
The journey the four members will go through will allow scientists to better understand the impacts that isolation, confinement and remote conditions have on the human body ahead of planned space missions in the future.
Not only will the crew perform scientific research and operational tasks during the experiment, they will also use virtual reality to see what it would be like to walk on the Martian surface and interact with mission control while facing the same communication delay that exists between Mars and Earth (of five to 22 minutes).
Human health studies will also be conducted, efforts that will focus on the physiological, behavioral and psychological responses of each crew member. These analyzes should help with ongoing research – a NASA collaboration with the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center (MBRSC) in the United Arab Emirates and the European Space Agency (ESA) – into what astronauts can expect in terms of mental health. and physics during a real trip to Mars.
Meet the crew of NASA’s simulated Mars mission
Jason Lee
Jason Lee lives in Boston, USA, and is an associate professor in residence at the School of Mechanical, Aerospace and Manufacturing Engineering at the University of Connecticut. He teaches thermal fluids, manufacturing, and sports engineering courses.
He holds a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and a master’s and doctorate from the University of Texas at Austin. His postgraduate research focused on manufacturing processes involving heat transfer and characterization of thermal protection materials. He did postdoctoral work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), studying high-strength nanofibers.
Stephanie Navarro
Born and raised by Ecuadorian parents in Miami, Stephanie Navarro is a space operations officer in the U.S. Air Force Reserve. She has more than a decade of service in the Air National Guard and was deployed in support of Operation Freedom Sentinel to help provide secure communications capabilities in the Middle East.
He began his civilian career as an information technology specialist for the U.S. Army, providing systems engineering for data center modernization efforts in Hawaii. She currently works at Northrop Grumman as a senior systems engineer, specializing in satellite communications programs.
She holds a bachelor’s degree in Physics from the University of Central Florida in Orlando. She recently completed a model-based systems engineering certificate program from the California Institute of Technology and is working toward a master’s degree in cybersecurity from the University of Maryland Global Campus.
Shareef Al Romaithi
Shareef Al Romaithi lives in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, and is a pilot with over 16 years of experience in the airline industry, having over 9,000 flying hours on various Airbus and Boeing aircraft. Currently, he commands Boeing 777 and 787 aircraft as captain.
He holds a bachelor’s degree in Aerospace Engineering and three master’s degrees from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, focusing on aerospace and aviation management, safety systems, and space operations, respectively. He is the youngest and eighth graduate in the world to earn a doctorate in aviation.
Piyumi Wijesekara
Currently living in San Francisco, California, Piyumi Wijesekara is a postdoc scientist at the Radiation Biophysics Laboratory at NASA Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley.
His research focuses on developing tissue models to investigate the effects of spaceflight stressors, including ionizing radiation and lunar dust, on the human respiratory system.
She holds a bachelor’s degree in Bioengineering from the University of California, San Diego, and a master’s and doctorate in Biomedical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. His doctoral thesis focused on stem cell and organ engineering, with an emphasis on engineering models that mimic human lung physiology, to study respiratory diseases.
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Jose Baca
Jose Baca is an assistant professor in the Department of Engineering at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi. His research interests involve designing modular systems, enhancing the capabilities of unmanned autonomous vehicles, and coordinating multi-robot teams in complex environments.
Graduated in Electrical Engineering from the Technological Institute of Matamoros, in Mexico, he obtained a master’s degree in Mechatronics from the Aachen University of Applied Sciences, in Germany, followed by a PhD in Automation and Robotics from the Polytechnic University of Madrid, in Spain.
Brandon Kent
A resident of Kinnelon, New Jersey, Brandon Kent is a chief medical officer in the pharmaceutical industry, supporting ongoing global efforts to develop new therapies for all types of cancer.
in Biochemistry and Biology from North Carolina State University in Raleigh, he received a PhD in Biomedicine from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, where his work focused primarily on how genetic factors regulate early embryonic development and development. of cancer.
After graduate school, Kent transitioned into oncology scientific and medical communications consulting, with a primary focus on clinical trial data dissemination, scientific exchange, and medical education initiatives.
While the HERA mission lasts just 45 days, NASA also has missions under the CHAPEA Program (which stands for Crew Health and Performance in Analogous Exploration), which investigate what it would be like to live a full year on Mars – in a 3D-printed habitat. called Mars Dune Alpha of 160 square meters. The first CHAPEA mission comes to an end on July 6, and registration for the second is already underway.
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