We have several goals for our mission, including science investigations and engineering projects designed to advance our understanding of what is needed for a human mission to Mars.
- Brian will conduct an active seismic survey using a towed land streamer system.
- Carla will manage our daily schedule and determine how we can balance science activities, engineering and Hab upkeep, life maintenance (food, sleep, recreation), exercise and health, and general morale.
- Darrel will fly a micro air vehicle to provide aerial reconnaissance prior to EVAs.
- LuÃs will collect samples to test for the presence of extremophiles (bacteria that live in extreme conditions, such as very cold and very dry).
- Mike will make observations of Jupiter and Saturn using the radio telescope.
- Kiri will collect digital images and evaluate an automated system for inferring the physical location of the image even in the absence of GPS tags (based on the image content).
- Darrel and LuÃs will test a possible advance in water re-use by reclaiming shower water, filtering and UV-sterilizing it, and measuring the amount of bacteria and other pollutants.
- We will all test fabric samples for a prototype space suit (NDX-2) from the UND Space Suit Laboratory.
- We will all participate in an ongoing Cornell University nutrition study, alternating days in which we prepare “regular” food with those in which we are limited to freeze-dried/reconstituted food.