A MARS EXPLORATION EXPERIMENT at the 8,000-foot elevation of Mauna Loa ends today when researchers leave the dome that has been their habitat for four months. HI-Seas, or Hawai`i Space Exploration Analog and Simulation, focused on diet of astronauts to be sent to Mars around the year 2030. As part of the routine, the “gastronauts” (the nickname relates to the dietary study), wore mock spacesuits when they left their dome to explore the northern slope of Mauna Loa. “We found life on ‘Mars’ at last!” wrote crewmember Oleg Abramov. The crew had lowered a camera and headlamps into a vent on a cinder cone and found a humus-covered floor densely vegetated with ferns, moss-covered walls and visible moisture. “This stands in stark contrast to the generally barren, lifeless landscape around us, and makes us suspect that this vent is actively emitting water vapor and possibly other volcanic gases, and likely has elevated internal temperatures,” Abramov said.
Posted on: Wed, 14 Aug 2013 04:16:47 +0000
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