Mars simulation on Hawaiian mountain ends after a year

The simulated Mars habitat in Hawaii.
(Image credit: Facebook/HawaiiSpaceExplorationAnalogSimulation)

Most people visit Hawaii to lounge on the beach, soak up the sun, and bask in the beauty of the islands. A group of six researchers, however, voluntarily spent the last year living with limited resources on top of a Hawaiian mountain in near isolation inside a Mars simulation.

The group consisted of a French astrobiologist, a German physicist, and four Americans: a pilot, a journalist, a soil scientist, and an architect. Experts estimate a human mission to Mars could take one to three years, and the study, funded by NASA and run by the University of Hawaii, focused on the toll a long space exploration would take on a person. For comparison, the typical International Space Station mission only lasts about six months.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.