ESA is preparing for future human exploration missions to Mars. We are currently looking for volunteers to take part in a 520-day simulated Mars mission.
To go to Mars is still a dream and one of the last gigantic challenges. But one day some of us will be on precisely that journey to the Red Planet. A journey with no way out once the spaceship is on a direct path to Mars. These men and women will have to take care of themselves for almost two years during the roundtrip. Their survival is in their own hands, relying on the work of thousands of engineers and scientists back on Earth, who made such a mission possible.
The crew will experience extreme isolation and confinement. They will lose sight of planet Earth. A radio contact will take 40 minutes to travel to us and then back to the space explorers.
A human mission to Mars is a bold vision for the time beyond the International Space Station. However, preparations have already started today. They are geared and committed to one goal: to send humans on an exploration mission to Mars, individuals who will live and work together in a spaceship for over 500 days.
ESA seeks candidates for simulated ‘Missions to Mars’ in 2008/2009
Mars Express’s OMEGA uncovers possible sites for life
By mapping minerals on the surface of Mars using the European Space Agency’s Mars Express spacecraft, scientists have discovered the three ages of Martian geological history – as reported in today’s issue of Science – and found valuable clues as to where life might have developed.
The new work shows that large bodies of standing water might only have been present on Mars in the remote past, before four thousand million years ago, if they were present at all. Within half a billion years, these conditions had faded away.
ESA Mars Express Image: The Libya Montes valley on Mars
These images, taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA’s Mars Express spacecraft, show the region of Libya Montes, south of the Isidis Planitia impact basin on Mars.
The HRSC obtained these images during orbit 922 with a ground resolution of approximately 14.3 metres per pixel at equatorial latitudes near longitude 81 East.
Mission to Mars via Antarctica
A few weeks before leaving for the Antarctic Concordia Station, the Italian-French crew that will spend over one year in one of the harshest, isolated environments on Earth, attended two days of preparatory training at ESA’s Headquarters in Paris, France. During their stay at the research station the crew will participate in a number of ESA experiments
Buried craters and underground ice – Mars Express uncovers depths of Mars
For the first time in the history of planetary exploration, the MARSIS radar on board ESA’s Mars Express has provided direct information about the deep subsurface of Mars. First data include buried impact craters, probing of layered deposits at the north pole and hints of the presence of deep underground water-ice.
Mars Express evidence for large aquifers on early Mars
Substantial quantities of liquid water must have been stably present in the early history of Mars. The findings of OMEGA, on board ESA’s Mars Express, have implications on the climatic history of the planet and the question of its ‘habitability’ at some point in its history. These conclusions were drawn thanks to data on Martian surface minerals obtained by OMEGA (Observatoire pour la Mineralogy, l’Eau, les Glaces et l’Activit
Mars Express radar collects first surface data
MARSIS, the sounding radar on board ESA
Water ice in crater at Martian north pole
These images, taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA