Go to Mars without really going

William Atkins
Sunday, 13 February 2011 00:34

Science - Space

The ESA and Russia are experimenting with a simulated manned flight to Mars, called Mars 500, at the Institute of Biomedical Problems in Moscow. The mission is testing the ability of astronauts to cope with the isolation and stress of outer space.

The Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP) is part of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which is headquartered in Moscow, Russia. It is the site of the experimental mission to Mars being conducted by the European Space Agency (ESA).

The Mars 500 project involves a crew of volunteers living and working in a mockup of a spacecraft going to Mars.

The mock mission began on June 3, 2010, when six volunteers began their 520-day mission to Mars.

The crew consisted of three Russians (Sukhrob Kamolov, a surgeon, Alexei Sitev, an engineer, and Alexander Smoleevsky, a physiologist), two Europeans (Romain Charles, a French engineer, and Diego Urbina, an Italian-Columbian engineer), and one Chinese (Wang Yue, a professional astronaut).

A February 11, 2011 Space.com article 'How Real Can a Fake Mars Mission Be?' talks more about the wannabe mission to Mars.

It begins, 'A 500-day mock mission to Mars may seem to some like an elaborate stunt, but the ongoing experiment '” now at the Martian "landing" stage '” has great potential to help prepare future astronauts for a real trip to the Red Planet, experts say.'

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