In the United States launched an experiment to simulate a flight to Mars

A scientific experiment to imitate the conditions of a flight to Mars began in Hawaii: six volunteers from the USA, France and Germany were isolated from the outside world for a year in a special complex on the side of the sleeping Mauna Loa volcano, vaguely reminiscent of the Red Planet landscape.

The international team of young scientists selected by competition for participation in this project included three men and three women. The crew commander became an American Carmel Johnson, dealing with the problems of soil science and ecology, reports TASS. Together with her, a physicist, engineer, biologist, doctor and architect who dreams of designing a permanent residential complex on Mars were voluntarily imprisoned.

Experts from NASA and the University of Hawaii expect that the experiment will help prepare the first manned flight to the red planet, which the US space agency hopes to implement in the 2030s. Experts are planning to study a number of medical and psychological problems that the crew of the ship may encounter when embarking on a long journey. During the year in isolation, scientists are to carry out a program of scientific research, being under constant observation.

The two-story building, which will be the team's permanent home for the whole year, is located at an altitude of 2,6 kilometers above sea level. It has the shape of a dome 7 meters high and its diameter is 12 meters. On the ground floor there is a scientific laboratory and utility rooms, on the second there are small bedrooms. The six recluses will be able to go outside approximately once a week only in space suits, and they will have to eat exclusively “space” food - frozen, freeze-dried or canned. In addition, they will be forced to use water extremely sparingly and will have limited access to the Internet.

Starting in 2013, this will be the fourth volunteer team condemning itself to imprisonment in an autonomous complex in Hawaii. The first two groups lived there for four months, the third - lasted twice as long. NASA has already spent 1,2 million dollars on this program, and in the next fiscal year it intends to spend another million.

The longest of all such experiments to simulate a flight to the red planet is considered to be Mars-500, conducted in Russia in 2010-2011. Six volunteers from Russia, France, Italy and China were in complete isolation for 520 days, which is how long the proposed flight to Mars and back will take.

Six Russian-speaking people are participating in the sensational expedition to colonize the red planet: five Russians and one Ukrainian. The “Forum” studied all the details about each one and found out that it did not agree on the most ambitious space project.

In 2011, the Dutchman Bas Landdorp also decided to organize reality show, whose members will fly to Mars and build a colony there.

Colonists were selected through the project site in three stages. In April, 2013, everyone registered for further selection. In total, 202586 applications were submitted from 140 countries of the world, the organizers say. In order to accept the application, you had to fill out a form and make a short video with answers to three questions: why do you want to go to Mars; do you have a sense of humor; why do you consider yourself the best candidate. Registration was paid to weed out frivolous candidates. According to the investigation Medium, participants paid differently - from $ 5 to $ 75.