Astronaut sharing 200-day diary

This is a note from Sheyna Gifford, NASA physicist and scientist who is participating in the mission to simulate HI-SEAS Mars IV.

My colleagues and I spent 200 days in a special area of ​​NASA called HI-SEAS IV. It was built to perfectly simulate the environment of Mars.

The persistent sunlight kept us energized to cook, store heat for the fireplace to fight the cold cuts of the skin in the evening and cook warm water to wash and clean our bodies.

In the evening, the sky is dark, dense with fog and dust storms. It was so cold that we had to wear up to 5 layers of shirts and gloves, turn on the heater constantly and drink hot tea to keep the body warm.

We have 165 days to build factories, perform some special experiments and build foundations for future residents to continue to settle, grow and grow. We must minimize physical injuries and fight everyday with the harshness of the environment.

Quiet space makes our psychology easy to fall into a state of depression and fear. The fun we often do together is to take pictures on strange colored stones with red, black, and gray swirls that mimic the rock on Mars.

200 days ago, my colleagues and I had to pretend to be astronauts who landed on Mars. I must say that NASA designers are really genius people. They made us experience almost the whole feeling that astronauts in the process of flying and landing on Mars were.

Images of tomatoes grown in Mars simulated environments.(Image source: NASA).

From the feeling of weightlessness to the shaking and intense pressure when the spacecraft landed on the surface of Mars (simulated). Here, the first scene that caught our eye was the hard, dry, lava-filled ground with lots of round holes of extremely large sizes.

Right after landing, we had to set up a dedicated tent with high technology support to be able to survive and withstand the harsh environment here. The life support devices in the tent all cost up to hundreds of thousands of dollars.

We set up tents next to a large volcano that was turned off in order to avoid huge wind and dust storms on Mars.

When we leave Earth, we carry a huge container of food-containing steel and spare energy storage devices.

Our crew consists of 6 people and it takes nearly a day to be able to erect structures, arrange tools and install astronomical devices.

Each person in the crew was given a survival bag. Inside this bag, in addition to survival aids, there are a number of other personal necessities such as shoes, socks, toothbrushes, water, warm hats, snacks, and a tablet.

In the first few months, we studied the areas around the base and discovered quite a few interesting things left from the previous human landings on Mars.

The first time we found fragments of a rocket. Later, we also discovered a dedicated robot that was rusted to observe the surface of the Martian decades ago.

The scenery and the details are so real that I sometimes forget that I am experimenting in a simulated space model on Earth rather than in real Mars.

And finally, the tomato seeds that we cultivated on Martian soil have also produced results.

Planting on lava rocks and harsh environments has caused the tomato fruit to be mutated. They are quite small in size and have a deep orange color.

However, after studying the composition of the substances in these tomatoes, we absolutely guarantee that they are edible and the percentage of nutrients is not much different from the tomatoes. cultivated on Earth.

In order to survive in the harsh environment of Mars, we have to wear space suits to provide the oxygen we need, to fight too hot or cold temperatures as well as dangerous ultraviolet rays.

On nights where Mars has no storm, we often go out for a walk and lie on lava rocks to observe the beautiful galaxy in the night sky. However, we still have to wear safety belts and safety belts attached to the base to prevent sudden storms from happening.

During stormy nights, we will sit back and forth together, take photos and record videos to document research as well as send to our families on Earth.

There are still 165 days left before we can finish our mission and return to Earth. Here, we can see the smallness of the human being between the vast universe.

The results of this simulation experiment will play a huge role in supporting the mission of astronauts to fly to Mars in the near future.