The Martian Scientist

Astrobiologist Cyprien Verseux is a member of the one-year Nasa HI-SEAS IV mission. Here, six scientists and engineers live and work in an 11-meter-diameter dome in perfect isolation on the slopes of the Mauna Loa volcano, in Hawaii. Everything they do emulates future crews on Mars to test psychological factors involved in, and technologies developed for, such missions. Make sure to follow the crews' project for ongoing updates "from Mars." Yesterday, I broke a flask. A little glass flask, which slipped from my hands. A cheap flask, easily replaceable, that I would have quickly forgotten about under normal conditions. But I am not under normal conditions. I am writing from a 36-foot-diameter white dome, on the slopes of the biggest volcano on Earth. I have been living here, together with five other people, for the past eight months. Since we arrived, I have not seen or spoken to anyone else, and I haven't been out in the open air. Showering is a luxury, limited to less than two minutes a week. Our internet access is limited to a few websites necessary to our work. Almost everything we do is monitored, with a complex set of devices ranging from video cameras to electronic badges we have to wear all day. Our dome "on Mars." Credit: Christiane Heinicke What crime did we commit to be confined here? None. It's even worse: we applied for the privilege. But I should start from the beginning. My name is Cyprien Verseux, and I am an astrobiologist. That doesn't mean that I ca...
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - Category: Science Source Type: news