Human Factors and Behavioral Research at a Mars Analog Habitat

Abstract

Long-duration space missions pose many challenges to the health of the crew and success of the overall mission. In addition to hazards of the space environment, such as radiation exposure and the effects of microgravity on the human body, poor interactions between crewmembers can result in tension, conflict, or degraded performance. Although scientists have learned a great deal about how to reduce the effects of physical hazards to the crew, few studies have examined ways to monitor the functioning of the crew during a long-duration mission in order to avoid breakdowns in crew performance. This research had two goals. First, we collected data on crew function and performance by administering a battery of behavioral and performance measures to a seven-person crew, comprised of five undergraduate students and two graduate students, during a 2-week mission to the Mars Desert Research Station in Winter 2013. Second, this setting provided a unique opportunity for human factors students to develop a research protocol and then collect data in a field setting. Each study addressed different ways to support crew psychological health in long duration spaceflight.The goals of this research were twofold. First, we sought to test several measures of crew function and performance at an Earth-based simulation of the Mars environment. The Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) is operated by the Mars Society and located at an isolated location in Utah. Each year, six-person crews spend between 2 to 4 weeks at the facility, which includes an enclosed habitat, a greenhouse, and allterrain vehicles, to simulate living and working on Mars. Crews are isolated from the outside world and communicate with offsite mission control personnel.In addition to evaluating the crew function measures, we also used this unique opportunity of spending 2 weeks at the MDRS as a learning experience. Each student on the crew was responsible for developing his or her own individual research project and then devising an experimental protocol for collecting data at this isolated location. In general, this research not only addressed a significant challenge for longduration space crews by evaluating measures to support and monitor crew functioning and performance for future missions, but human factors students were able to conduct their own study in a realistic simulation of life on Mars. BACKGROUND

Terrestrial Analogue Research to Support Human Performance on Mars: A Review and Bibliographic Analysis

“…Most crews carry out two-to three-week missions under the constraints of a simulated Mars mission 1 http://mdrs.marssociety.org/. Several missions have examined crew function and performance from a variety of perspectives, e.g., psychological support [29,30], challenging workloads [31,32], and team composition [33]. These missions aimed to explore different ways to support crew psychological health in prolonged space missions.…”

Designing for Mars

“…These factors surfaced during a recent human factors research mission to the Mars Society's Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) (Iwig, et al, 2013). The MDRS is situated in an isolated location in the Utah desert.…”