Journalist Report – February 18th

Sol 18: The conclusion – Going back to Earth

Author : Pierre Fabre

Hi everyone! This is our last report on Mars. (It won’t be the longest report I’ve made because it has been a very busy day and we are currently enjoying the best burger ever with Atila).

Let me talk to you a bit about what happened during this last Sol on Mars.

This day was the day of the lasts. Last workout, last breakfast, last EVA, last lunch, last rehydrated food, last everything on Mars.

At 3:00 PM, the same hour at which we started the simulation 3 weeks ago, we didn’t put our spacesuits on, we stepped into the front airlock, we didn’t wait 5 minutes for depressurisation, we opened the door, and just as during our first EVA, the light came into the airlock and blinded us for a moment, but this time it was the light of our dear planet Earth. It was a really weird sensation to leave the station by the same door we passed through so many times wearing our spacesuits for EVAs. This time we could feel the fresh air on our skin, hear the noises around us, talk without pressing the button of our walkie-talkie, breathing fresh air that hadn’t passed through our ventilation system, touch things with our hands and feel the contact on our skin. We took the same pictures we took on our Sol 0 before starting the sim. I think we look pretty much the same. Maybe on today’s picture we look a bit more tired, dirtier and more in shape (thanks to Julie’s workouts). You can still see in our eyes that we feel excited but it has nothing to do with the excitation we felt before starting the sim. On the Sol 0 it was the excitation of going on Mars and performing incredible experiments during 3 weeks. Today we were excited to contact our families and our friends, to see what happened on Earth during the mission, to see the reactions of people on Earth to our mission and last but not least we were excited because of the double bacon cheeseburger we are going to eat for dinner with Atila.

To conclude this last report, I am going to let my crew mates tell their favorite moment of the mission

"Julie: The games at night were a great moment to share with my crewmates. It’s the only moments when you have the right to not be serious, to not think about your work, to laugh, to get to know your partners better. These moments partly made us a real team and above all real friends.

Marion: I really enjoyed the EVAs, those were the moments where I really felt on Mars. I had never seen scenery like this, one moment you’re on Mars, the next you’re on the Moon. The views are breath-taking, every time we stopped at a viewpoint, I tried to print an image of the view in my brain to never forget it.

Maxime: The EVAs shared with my crewmates were definitely my favorite moments, we really felt we were on Mars. Each EVA was unique for me and seeing this amazing red landscape gave me incredible sensations.

Clément: There are many, but a big one was walking back into Candor Chasma for the first time since my first mission. I think it brought back a whole lot of memories from the first time I went there, and it reminded me of how awesome it was to be there at MDRS again!

François: My favorite moment was certainly the end of the day, when all crew members just sat and talked about their day, after all the work done. We could finally rest a little bit and enjoy talking and joking with each other.

For my part, it has been a pleasure to write those daily reports during those 3 weeks and I hope you enjoyed them. Don’t forget, there will be a bonus episode of "Interview with" when we will be back on Earth with Raphael, our Botanist who couldn’t make it to Mars with us.

Journalist Report- February 14th

Sol 14: Interview with: Astronomer – The man who protects us from the Sun

Author: Pierre Fabre

Hi everyone welcome back! In today’s report we are going to talk with Maxime, our astronomer! I’ve been waiting for this episode of “Interview with” for a long time I hope you will enjoy it!

But before starting this cool interview, let’s talk about what happened during this Sol 14 on Mars.

Today was the first day of our last week on Mars. To be perfectly honest today was quite hard. It was the comeback of human factors experiment (and of the terrible « shape test » of the University of Lorraine), but also the comeback of another enemy, the routine. I haven’t talked to you about routine so far but I think it becomes important now. The first reason for this omission is that I try to make the reports I write entertaining so I don’t want to talk to you about the things we do every day. Another reason is that even us, have really noticed the side effect of routine only recently.

At the beginning of the mission, routine was the perfect ally, it allowed us to be efficient in setting all our experiments which took us a long time. Every day was made of new goals: repairing the 3D printer, first mapping with drones, installation of the LOAC experiment, recycle water for the first time, … But now that our experiments are all set, our work is composed of tasks we perform every day mechanically and it is now hard to distinguish one afternoon from another. With all the fatigue accumulated since the beginning of the mission, it is sometimes hard to find the motivation required to work and the need for a nap after a morning of EVA is becoming more present recently. But it also means that we are being more efficient in our work and that we can now afford moments of rest during the day while keeping on doing our job.

Ok now I have to say, at least for the families, that there is nothing to worry about. I think this slump is a quite normal phenomenon after two weeks of mission. We are still motivated to do the job until the end and excited about what we are living on Mars.

I think we still feel as excited as on the very first day before going on an EVA.

This morning for example, we went to the Moon Overlook, it was the first time for Marion and me who stayed at the Hab last time. We were really amazed by the transformation of the landscape in just a couple of minutes of rover. One moment you are on Mars, surrounded by red dunes and suddenly, you teleport and you are on the Moon, everything around you is gray on kilometers. We took some really nice drone shots but they have nothing to do with the drone shots we’ve been taking since our arrival on Mars! This is one way of breaking the routine!

There are still exciting things happening in the station too! Yesterday, Julie tested the 3D printed funnel designed by Maxime and Francois to recycle water more efficiently. This night she recycled 10 times as much water as she usually does thanks to the new funnel. Now we will be able to take showers more frequently and it will definitely make this last week easier for us!

Now it is time to show you what we talked about with Maxime this afternoon! This is the “Interview with: Astronomer”!

“-Hi Maxime, how are you?

-Hi Pierre, well listen after 2 weeks of mission it’s going very well and you?

-I’m fine! Maxime, do you want to introduce yourself for those who don’t know you yet?

-Of course, my name is Maxime Jalabert and I am in my last year of the engineering cycle at the ISAE-SUPAERO engineering school. I have always been passionate about space, I got my first telescope when I was 6 years old and I spent my evenings observing the stars with my father. It was probably those moments that made me want to be an astronaut one day. In high school I was a very involved member of the astronomy club and it was natural for me to continue with higher education. So, after a Bachelor’s degree at Paul Sabatier University in Toulouse I joined the engineering school ISAE-SUPAERO. I had the opportunity to be president of the M.A.R.S club which sends 7 students from the school to the MDRS where we are. As part of an internship, I worked for two months at the Cité de l’Espace as a scientific animator, and last year I was able to design an instrument for measuring the scintillation of stars and satellites from a telescope at the Centre Spatial Universitaire de la Côte d’Azur in Nice. Then, I did an ERASMUS at the University of Stockholm where I followed courses in astrophysics and astronomy. And next semester I’m going to Yale University still in the US to work on space propulsion. As you can see, it was natural for me to apply for this MDRS mission, especially for the role of astronomer.

-Wow, what a background! So, you are the astronomer of this crew, can you explain what is your job during this mission?

-You have to know that Mars does not have a magnetosphere that deflects charged particles from the Sun like the Earth does. My role as an astronomer is therefore to analyse solar activity in order to be able to plan or not plan extravehicular sorties because these charged particles are lethal for us human beings. The shield of the station protects us, but our suits are too thin to provide lasting protection. Strong activity of the Sun results in the presence of visible solar flares on the surface, so my role is to analyse them.

-We didn’t have such issue so far but thanks for protecting us from the Sun! Maxime, you also have an astrophotography project and a research project, can you tell us more?

-Yes, when I’m not on a spacewalk or analysing the Sun I spend my time on these two projects. My research project focuses on the search for supaernovae. The method is simple: for a given galaxy I photograph it several times at different time intervals, I then study the evolution of the luminous flux of the galaxy and if it increases I can then superpose the shots to find the supernova. The method is simple but with about 30 galaxies studied the probability of finding a supernova in 3 weeks is only about 2%. My astrophotography project consists in taking pictures of known objects like the Orion Nebula. After processing, I will use these photos to popularize science, especially in my former high school in my hometown, Limoux. The aim is to transmit my passion for space and maybe even give young students the desire to pursue higher education.

-And what is your favourite project?

-I think I get more pleasure from astrophotography. The infinitely far away has always fascinated me and I still feel a sense of wonder when I see the different pictures taken through the telescopes. Then the idea of transmitting this feeling to people who are more or less sensitive to space through these pictures I find very beautiful somehow.

-Ok I think I understand why. And on another subject, why did you choose to take part in an analog mission?

-The first dream I had as a child was to become an astronaut and to be honest, I still do. So, the MDRS mission was an opportunity to put yourself in the shoes of an astronaut for a certain period of time, while doing some great science. I think, especially the study of human factors in a hostile environment like the Martian environment. In addition to this, we can achieve good communication, always with the aim of raising public awareness of the space world.

-What is your favourite thing about Mars?

-The spacewalks are probably my favourite thing about Mars. The preparation before the spacewalk with the increasing heart rate, the tension when putting on the spacesuits and finally the accomplishment of the opening of the depressurisation airlock with the red Martian desert as far as the eye can see gives me a very strong feeling. Each EVA is a unique experience for me.

-Do you miss Earth sometimes?

-Of course, I miss it, but I think we’ve all prepared for it. On Earth I’m lucky enough to have access to everything in a very short time, whether it’s food we take the car or we walk to the supermarket. If you need information, you get out your phone and look it up on the internet. On Mars that’s not possible, we make do with what we have and it’s quite a challenge when you’ve been lucky enough to live in this societal luxury. I sincerely think that I have taken a step back on my everyday life on Earth and I am happy to have received this sensitivity to our society of overconsumption. Most importantly, I usually talk to my family several times a week and to my friends. Not hearing from them is not easy every day but that’s the part of the game. I really look forward to meeting them at the end of the mission and telling them about this great adventure.”

That’s it for today’s interview, I hope you enjoyed it! The next episode will be “Interview with: Journalist”. I still don’t know how to interview myself but we will come up with something. Stay tuned if you don’t want to miss this next episode of “Interview with”!

Journalist Report – February 16th

Sol 16: Interview with: Journalist – How to share our experience with people on Earth?

Author: Pierre Fabre

Hi everyone, welcome! Today we are going to do the “Interview with: Journalist”. My crewmates have prepared questions for me and I can’t wait to answer them!

But before, as always, let’s talk about what happened during this Sol 16 on Mars.

We are going to do that quickly today because there is not a lot of time left before the end of the communication window – time has caught up to me as I wrote the interview! Moreover, this was a fairly quiet day.

This morning, Maxime, François, and Clément went to explore the South of the station for once. They went to the region called Kissing Camels. According to them, the south is really beautiful in its Martian style. They climbed a ridge and they found a beautiful view. There was a lot of wind today and they were a bit scared that the winds could get high enough to knock over scientific equipment, but the weather stayed true to the forecast in the weather report yesterday, so they had nothing to fear. They also found some petrified wood. I personally don’t know much about that subject but it is really beautiful to see.

This afternoon, Marion, our crew scientist, made a lot of videos about our experiments. Now I can tell you that videos of “Interview with” and “Focus on” will be released on our YouTube channel when we will be back on Earth. I think it will be very interesting. Marion will work on the “Focus on” part and I will do the “Interview with” part, we can’t wait to edit and show you those videos.

Now it is time for the “Interview with”! Clément, as he was the crew’s Journalist two years ago, will start this interview. I hope you will enjoy it!

“Clément: Hi Pierre! How are you today?

Pierre: Fine thank you! It feels a bit weird to be on the other side and become the one who has to answer the questions!

Clément: Ok so first, can you introduce yourself to those who don’t know you yet?

Pierre: I see that you’ve learned the format of the “Interview with”! Ok so, my name is Pierre Fabre and I’m the Crews 240’s journalist! I’m an engineering student at ISAE-SUPAERO. I have done an Erasmus at Escuela Politécnica de Madrid in Data Science and Machine Learning. During my gap year, I’ve done an internship as a research assistant at LAAS-CNRS, a French lab, in control theory on the subject of event-based command for nonlinear systems.

When we come back on Earth, I will do another internship at Safran, in Paris, in Model Predictive Control. For my last year at ISAE-SUPAERO, I want to specialise in control theory and autonomous systems. In my future work, I would like to associate control theory with reinforcement learning for applications that make sense for me, that help people in their daily lives. Apart from that, I love climbing, especially bouldering. I can’t wait for next semester to go to Fontainebleau in Paris which is kind of a paradise on Earth for bouldering.

Clément: Pierre, as you said in your introduction, you are the journalist of this crew, can you explain what is your job.

Pierre: Ok so, basically the journalist has to send a daily journalist’s report to the MDRS’s staff. This implies going to talk to every crew member to ask them how they feel, what they did during the day, how their experiments are doing. These are the basics. In addition to that, I also have to translate my reports into French every day and send them to Earth. Then, our colleagues on Earth post the reports in both languages on our website and they do posts on social media with the pictures.

Julie: Hi Pierre! I wanted to ask you: Why did you choose to apply for the role of Journalist?

Pierre: Hi Julie! That is a good question! I think that Journalist is an important role. It is important for people on Earth because thanks to the reports, they can follow our mission and share this unique experience with us. It is important for the families who want to have news from us and know how the mission goes. But it is also important for us because it allows us to describe how we feel and what we are doing here which is something we can only do through the reports! I felt attracted by this responsibility and in the meantime, I think I kind of like to write and tell stories!

Maxime: Hi Pierre! I wanted to know: What is your favourite part of the job?

Pierre: Hi Maxime! Hmmm, that is a hard one! I think what I like the most is doing the “Interview with” and the “Focus on” formats. I love “Interview with” because it is a really nice opportunity to talk with every crew member one by one. This can seem a little weird but it is true, there are not tons of occasions like that where you are only two in the same room. The interview itself is really cool and I love to share them with you because it allows you to know us better, but the conversations we have off-camera are even better because we can talk honestly about the issues we deal with, how we feel, and sometimes it allows me to help make things better if I can.

I also love the “Focus on” format for the reasons we talked about in yesterday’s report. I think this mission is a really nice opportunity to talk about Mars, Space, and Science in general to a wide audience and I love the idea that some people might learn things reading my reports.

Marion: Hi Pierre! And what is the most difficult part of the job?

Pierre: Hi Marion! Another hard one! I have once again two answers in mind! The first one is the fact that my days are kind of shifted compared to the other crew members. Let me explain. It is hard to talk about what happened during the day before the day is over. I have to wait until the end of the afternoon before thinking about the construction of the first part of the report (the second part, “Interview with” and “Focus on” episodes are made sooner in the day so they are not really a problem).

So, this means that most of the time my work for the first part of the report and the translation starts when my crewmates end their day and start chilling. This can be very frustrating because they seem to enjoy those moments of resting, discussing, laughing and I can’t share those with them.

Another difficult part is the lack of feedback. The only feedbacks are the ones from my crewmates when they want/have the time to read my reports, the ones from the MDRS staff, and the ones from our colleagues on Earth. There are, I hope, more people that read those reports and it is sometimes frustrating not to have their feedback.

François: Hi Pierre! I was wondering where does your inspiration come from?

Pierre: Hi François! Good question! Before the mission, I was really worried about the lack of inspiration, the white page syndrome. Three weeks is a lot and I wasn’t sure I would be able to find interesting topics every day. Moreover, as the days are passing there are fewer things that happen during the day, as we have noticed already, and as a consequence, fewer things to put in my reports. That’s why I created a plan before the mission. Every “Interview with” or “Focus on” episode was scheduled, I knew when I would do reports about Martian Food or Martian House.

This is a relief for me because even if I have nothing to say about the day, I still have something interesting to put in my reports! With that source of stress removed, the inspiration comes quite naturally. To be honest, I don’t think my style of writing requires a lot of inspiration, I just try to talk about what happened during the day in a way that everyone can understand and still enjoy.

Clément: Pierre, you’ve spent the last three weeks or so is our only contact to the Earth, but we didn’t have a lot of access to information from out there. How does it feel to know that in a few days, you’ll be able to see the reaction everyone on the outside has had to your work?

Pierre: Wow! I hadn’t thought about that before you asked, but I guess you know what you are talking about as a former Journalist. Let me think. I am pretty excited to see the reactions to my reports, as I said to Marion, the lack of feedback is sometimes hard to deal with, but I’m also quite nervous about it. I really don’t know what to expect, I don’t even know how many people are reading those reports.

I think it will definitely feel good if I receive positive comments on the work I’ve been putting in those reports but it will feel terribly frustrating if I read constructive comments on how to make my report better because it will be too late to do something about it. The worst scenario would be to discover that no one cares but let’s not think about it! Sorry for that messy answer but this is all I have! “

That’s it for today’s “Interview with”! It was really cool to be on the other side of the interview and my crewmates asked me some really interesting questions! I have good news for you, this was not the last episode of this format. When we will be back on Earth, I will do the last episode with Raphael, our botanist who couldn’t take off with us to Mars! I can’t wait to do this interview; it is important for me to do it!

Journalist Report February 15th

Journalist Report: Sol 15: Focus on: Martian Agriculture – How to grow food on Mars?

Author: Pierre Fabre

February 15, 2022

Hi everyone and welcome back! In today’s report we are going to talk about Martian agriculture with Julie for this new episode of “Focus On”! I can’t wait to talk to you about those cool experiments!

But before let’s talk a bit about what happened during this Sol 15 on Mars!

This afternoon, those who hadn’t gone yesterday on the human factors experiment of the University of Lorraine had to do it. As always it was really tiring and they didn’t seem to have appreciated it. I’ve been talking to you a lot (too much maybe?) about the « shapes test » task and how terrible it was to stay focused during 15 minutes straight but today I want to be fair and talk to you about another task of that experiment. The first task is to click on the button as soon as a cross appears on the screen. It is pretty simple and the aim is to measure your reactivity. We have all noticed that we performed better before the mission and that the more tired we were, the worse the performance was. This simple example shows how relevant this experiment can be in our context and we all hope that they will be able to draw interesting conclusions thanks to our data.

To comfort them, Marion made Martian cookies for the crew and they were honestly delicious! We are starting to think about writing an entire recipe book about Martian food rather than giving you the recipes in my reports. I think it would be cool and we will let you know if the book is published one day!

After that, Marion and François took a moment to do a podcast to answer questions we had received from middle school students. Those questions were really interesting and we really thank them for having sent them. Sometimes, they were quite hard to answer and we had to discuss all together to find a satisfying answer. It is always a pleasure to use this mission and the subject of space as a way to inspire and to talk about science to students. This is something we do a lot at the Mars Club of ISAE-SUPAERO in partnership with OSE which is a social association that acts in favour of equality of chances in education. Raphael, the seventh member of the crew who was not able to take off with us, was in charge of the popularisation of science section of the Mars Club and he did an excellent job. He contacted so many teachers and went, with other members of the club, in so many middle and high schools to talk about Mars, Space and Science in general. We are really grateful for all the work he put into sharing his passion and his knowledge with students. I also see our daily reports as an opportunity to try to talk about Space and Science in general in an understandable and entertaining way so that every reader, no matter how young or knowledgeable they are, can hopefully learn something at the end of the day, at least it would make me really happy if it turns out to be the case.

Talking about learning things, it is time to start this new episode of “Focus on: Martian Agriculture”. I hope you will enjoy it! Let’s see what Julie has to say on that subject!

“-Hi Julie! Thanks for taking time to talk about your experiments with us! Can you start by introducing the startup you’ve been in contact with for this experiment?

-Toopi organics is a French start-up that specializes in collecting urine, their treatment and its use as a fertiliser. I contacted this company as I was looking for experiments about ecology and more specifically on the topic of recycling and better use of our resources. During my research, I found them and their work intrigued me. Simply put, urine can be used to enhance the growth of microorganisms. Thus, Toopi Organics developed a solution from urine creating an efficient fertiliser. For me, reusing and recycling our waste is something that makes sense on Earth but even more so for a Mars or space mission where we constantly have to consciously save our resources and think about possibilities to reuse our waste. This is why I wanted to cooperate with Toopi Organics on this topic of urine recycling for agriculture. They proposed two different experiments on this theme and helped us elaborate protocols.

-Ok cool! Let’s start with the first experiment, can you tell us more?

-The first experiment is on the topic of spirulina growth. Spirulina is a micro alga from fresh water, rich in nutrients and particularly proteins. It is also easy to cultivate locally. These last two characteristics make this alga environmentally friendly and its growth is very relevant in the context of a Martian simulation mission: easy and fast to cultivate, rich in proteins and does not take a lot of space. In this experiment, two containers are used where the spirulina is floating in a solution containing sodium bicarbonate, sea salt, iron and some stabilised and filtered urine. In the first container, the urine is diluted by a factor of 100 whereas in the second one, it is diluted by a factor of 140. The goal is to study the impact of urine for the growth of spirulina and see if a higher urine concentration will affect its growth rate. On this experiment, we had a technical problem and it has to be redone. I hope that our colleagues from Crew 263 of Supaero will be able to redo it and get great results.

-Yes, I hope too! And what about the second one?

-The second experiment is also very original. Thanks to different rovers sent on Mars, researchers have been able to reproduce Martian soil. This Martian soil is much less compatible with agriculture. It requires good fertilisers for plants to grow in and this stabilised and filtered urine could be one of them. This second experiment consists in growing soybeans in Martian soil that were previously inoculated with a solution containing the urine fertiliser. Therefore, I prepared two solutions with Toopi Organics products: one control solution as a classic fertiliser and a solution containing urine that will be used as our fertiliser of interest. In the two “control” pots, I planted soybeans inoculated with the control solution in Martian soil. In the two other pots, I planted soybeans with the urine-based fertiliser. It has been around two weeks since the beans were planted and the results are exciting. The soy beans grew in all four pots however the ones containing the urine fertiliser are growing at a faster rate. After six weeks and with the help of Crew 263 of Supaero, we will measure the length of the roots, the length of the sprout and the biomass to have quantitative results. I am already very happy with the beginning of this experiment!

-That’s so cool! Julie, thank you very much for your time, it was great to talk about those really interesting experiments with you!“

That’s it for today’s episode of “Focus on”. I hope you enjoyed it! The last episode of “Focus on” will be on drones so stay tuned not to miss it!

Journalist Report

Sol 13: Preparation – How to prepare a Mars mission?

Hi everyone and welcome back! In today’s report, we are going to talk about the preparation for a Martian mission.

I’m not going to talk a lot about what happened during this Sol 13 because:

1. It is Sunday, so it is not a very busy day

2. It is Sunday, so I think I deserve to rest at least this afternoon.

However, I can talk to you a bit about what happened this morning.

Even on Sunday, we still have work to do on Mars. We had to change the battery of the LOAC experiment as every day. This time, Marion and Clément heroically volunteered. They took that opportunity to install two other instruments: PurpleAir and the electric field mill. From the window of the Hab, I watched them doing their job and they did it really well. They managed to successfully install those experiments which was not easy with the gloves and the spacesuits. Now, we will start gathering data for the CNRS thank to them.

After this intense morning, at least for them two, we will finally have the lunch everybody has been waiting for since the beginning of the mission: Martian Burgers. Our Commander has already started to cook the buns and I can’t wait to taste those Martian Burgers. We will make the burger patties with rehydrated beef and add some fresh cherry tomatoes from the GreenHab. Even Gordon Ramsay has never tasted something like that. We hope it won’t become an episode of Kitchen Nightmare but we feel pretty confident.

Now let’s talk about the preparation of this Martian mission.

As some of you may already know, we’ve been preparing this mission for two years now. In fact, it was supposed to be one year, but due to Covid, we weren’t able to take off last year but we managed to delay the mission to this year.

Let’s start by the beginning of this adventure. We were chosen for this mission in December 2019. A jury composed by former crew members and professors from ISAE-SUPAERO, studied our profiles and had us take an interview to determine if we would be part of the crew and for which role.

After the selection, we started the preparation of the mission. There were, in my opinion, three main objectives.

Find sponsors and collect funds to pay for the mission. Indeed, the mission has a cost and we had to collect 20000€ to pay for everything. This part was hard because we had no experience in this domain. But we learned. We sent mails to companies, we called them and sometimes they were ready to come on this adventure with us and financially support us. Here is a list of those who accepted to support us. This list does not include those related to experiments, we will talk about them later.

-CNES is the French Space Agency. We have been working with them for outreach for younger people via the Mars Club.

-Parrot, a French drone manufacturer who also lent us two ANAFI drones which we use for my drone mapping experiment.

-The Student Association of our School which accepted to support the project via the Mars Club.

-The Fondation ISAE-SUPAERO, which is very supportive for student projects.

-Sahut-Conreur, a French company interested by the use of 3D printing for metal working applications

-Acticity, an association that acts for education of young people which is a value we strongly share

-Planète Mars, the French branch of the Mars Society. They help popularise the idea of visiting Mars in the future.

-Société générale is a large French bank partner of the Student Association of our school. They are always interested in students projects.

Find experiments to bring with us on Mars. This is a very important component of the preparation. There is no interest in going on Mars if we don’t have relevant experiments to perform there. So we did our research about experiments that would be interesting for our mission and we contacted companies and labs. It was really interesting to exchange with researchers and create procedures for the mission. Thanks to our work, we have a lot of relevant experiments to talk to you about in our « Focus on » episodes. Some labs have also accepted to financially support us to bring their experiments.

-SacLab, a ISAE-SUPAERO’s lab for which we perform the TELEOP experiment

-CNRS for which we gather data with LOAC, PurpleAir, the electric field mill and soon Mega-ARES.

-The University of Lorraine for which we perform, not without pain, the human factor experiment that includes the terrible « shapes test ».

And last objective, but not least: become a real crew. This includes:

-Get to know each other

-Learn to work together

-Learn to rely on the crew

This is really important when you are planning on going to another planet with 6 other people you don’t know yet. For that purpose, we have been meeting every week for two years. Once again, COVID complicated everything and we had to meet most of the times on Zoom. Despite that, I think we still managed to create a team spirit and I think that now we are all very good friends!

This preparation was like a marathon, you have to stay focused during two years and never lose your motivation. The second year, after the rescheduling, was the worst. It was hard to go back on working on a mission that was already prepared. On top of that, the borders between Europe and the USA were still closed so we were starting to work again towards a mission we still didn’t know if we could do. Yet we persevered, and despite the setbacks we’ve made it all the way there on Mars, and in the end that means all the work was worth it. Sure, we’ve all changed a little after a year of delay, either from our experiences of work and studies, or simply in our outlook of what this mission means to us, but the joy of getting to work on a mission we worked so hard for is still the very same.

Journalist Report – February 12th

Sol 12: Focus on: 3D printing – How to repair or construct things on Mars.

Author : Pierre Fabre

Hi everyone, welcome back for a new episode of “Focus on”! In today’s episode we are going to talk about 3D printing with Maxime. It is going to be super cool!

But, as always, we are going to talk about what happened on Mars during this Sol 12.

First, as today was a Saturday, we didn’t have sports this morning for the same reasons as last week. I think it is worth mentioning it because it felt so good to stay in bed a little longer. Everyone looked happier and smelled definitely better than usual at breakfast.

Then, the day was similar to a week day. On Mars, we work on Saturdays!

We started this day by an EVA. As I told you yesterday, we went back to the Special Region to do drone mapping. This time, Marion and I, who stayed at the Hab yesterday, were part of the team and Maxime was our EVA leader.

We started our EVA, as usual, by changing the battery from the LOAC experiment. Then we made a first stop at the crossroad with Galileo Road. I wanted to map the part of the Hab Ridge situated after the North Ridge for my drone mapping experiment. Everything went well and I will soon have a beautiful 3D map to analyse. I’m starting to be more efficient and confident with the drones and it is very satisfying. Even if I never told you before, I think you can easily imagine that manipulating and operating a drone with a spacesuit and gloves is not easy at all. Next week, we are going to do another round of comparing how my crewmates perform on this terrain regarding whether or not they have the 3D map. The episode of “Focus on: Drone mapping” in which I am going to explain you everything is coming soon so stay tuned!

After this stop, we kept going North with the rovers until reaching the Special Region. It was pretty similar to the description our crewmates gave us, except that in reality it was a lot more impressive and beautiful. We were really amazed by the view we had from the top of the Ridge. I took some really nice drone pictures and videos up there. We will definitely find a way to show you those cool videos when we will be back on Earth I promise, but you can already have a taste with the photos.

It was a 4-hour long EVA, the longest ever made in this crew, and we were very tired when we came back. When we went upstairs after leaving our spacesuits, we had the best surprise you can expect when coming back from an EVA like this. Our lovely crew mates had cooked fried rice, a lot of fried rice. It was the best thing I’ve tasted since my arrival on Mars (yes, better than the famous Martian Pizza). If some of you want the recipe, I can ask my Commander and put it in a next report. (I will probably do it anyway as I will not receive your feedbacks).

This afternoon was a pretty calm one. Some crew members, including me, took that opportunity to take a well-deserved shower. On Mars, we don’t take shower as frequently as on Earth. The average time between two showers in the crew is one week. Now you start to understand why I said before that we usually smell bad at breakfast. As mentioned in the “Focus on: Water on Mars” episode, water on Mars is even more precious than on Earth so we have to use it carefully!

This afternoon, our team of 3D printing engineers, Maxime and François, finally managed to print the piece to assemble the base and the mast of the Mega-ARES experiment. This was a very long journey with lots of ups and downs. Thanks to their hard work, we will soon be able to assemble the experiment during an EVA and start gathering precious data for CNRS.

Talking about 3D printing, it is time to start this new episode of “Focus on” with Maxime! Let’s see what we talked about!

“-Hi Maxime! How are you today?

-Super thank you!

-Maxime, I asked you to do this episode of “Focus on: 3D printing” because you are in charge of a 3D printing experiment. But first let me ask you something. Why is 3D printing relevant for space application?

-As you know, on a space mission we are isolated and it is very difficult to have new objects from the Earth. On Mars, if we break our hammer, we have to wait 6 months before getting a new one. That is why we use 3D printing. We are able to build and replace any objects to optimize our experiments for example. In the International Space Station, there is a 3D printer, and the French astronaut Thomas Pesquet used it to print… a fork!

Moreover, the European Space Agency is working on new printers able to print buildings on the Moon from the lunar regolith. Hopefully, we will be able to see them working at the end of the decade.

-Ok I see, it is very convenient! And now, can you explain what is the objective of your experiment?

-Through the composite repairing in a frugal context we want to demonstrate the relevance of the use of additive fabrication in space applications. This project is held by Pr. Yves Gourinat, professor of Mechanical Engineering and Structures at ISAE-SUPAERO.

In our context of a Martian Life Simulation, we had to choose a printer according to the trio Volume – Mass – Energy, the main parameters of space exploration. Thanks to our school, we are able to use the 3D printer « Creality CR-10 Series V2 » which respects the parameters below.

The first operation consists in repairing an impacted carbon structure. During an EVA, I saw a small impact on our HAB. On Mars, this one can lead to a leak and put us in danger in the station. With the software AutoDesk Fusion 360, I designed a fitting piece and printed it with our 3D-printer with the help of our engineer François. Obviously, we are not allowed to modify the Hab but with this experiment we are able to prove the relevance of a 3D-printer for a space application.

-Ok nice! And do you use the 3D printer for other purposes?

-As I mentioned at the beginning you can use the 3D-printer for many reasons. On our side we used the 3D-printer twice.

Our HSO Julie aka July works on a recycling water experiment and she asked me to participate by printing a specific funnel for her new dispositive named « Dudish » in the memory of our Botanist Raphaël, who couldn’t come to MDRS.

And Clément asked me to print a piece to maintain the mast of the instrument Mega-Ares.

-Wow, so cool! There are so many applications of 3D printing, I’m not surprised that some people want to use it in space application! Maxime, thank you very much for your time, it is a really cool experiment that you have and I enjoyed talking about it with you!”

That’s it for today’s “Focus on” episode I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did! I also hope you learned something about 3D printing. If you like this format, stay tuned because another episode is coming soon!

Journalist Report – February 11th

Sol 11: Interview with: Engineer – The man who keeps the station in one piece

Hi everyone! Today is a new episode of “Interview with”. We are going to talk with François, our crew engineer I’ve been mentioning multiple times as our hero. I can’t wait to show you what we talk about but before, let’s talk a bit about this Sol 11 on Mars.

Today, we realised that we are closer to the end of this mission than we are to its beginning. For some members of the crew, it’s good news because they miss their families and friends and are becoming nostalgic about life on Earth. Apart from that, the crew is doing well, everyone is healthy and in good shape. This was mostly for the families who are reading this report, there is nothing to worry about.

For her second time as EVA leader, Julie decided to explore a very mysterious region of the surroundings of the station. This region is located far north from the station and it is called: the Special Region. Even on our map, the zone is partially hidden by red stripes that give it a forbidden aspect. My crewmates decided to go there to find out what was truly there with the idea of potentially going back tomorrow to map the area with the drone if it was worth it. They went as close as they could by the road with the rovers. Then, they climbed on a ridge and were amazed by the view. If you looked to one side of the ridge, you could see a really narrow canyon that would be very interesting to 3D map. If you then looked to the other side of the ridge, the landscape was now made of dunes with beautiful red colours. They climbed down the ridge and started to explore the canyon. I can’t wait to go there tomorrow to map the area with the drone and see this incredible view from the ridge with my own eyes!

In the meantime, Marion and I stayed at the Hab and performed the TELEOP experiment. I’m starting to appreciate to teleoperate this rover on the moon: going to a particular zone, grabbing a sample and docking it to the lander. It is pretty similar to a video game! It is definitely funnier that the « shape test » from the experiment of the University of Lorraine. But they are both really interesting human factors experiments.

Talking about the « shape test », those who were spared yesterday had to do it this afternoon. It is pretty funny to see them walk into their room full of life and joy and leaving it dead inside. I’m not exaggerating (ok maybe a bit), this is really hard when you are as tired as we are. But this was the last day, there won’t be human factors experiments this weekend and that is such good news.

Today we had also good news from the GreenHab. First, the soy beans Julie planted some days ago are starting to grow and we can already see a green thing making its way out of the soil. It was the first thing she had ever planted so she was really excited when she discovered it this morning. She has also recently put the Spirulina in the two solutions I talked about in a previous report. We hope the Spirulina will grow well and that we will see the difference between the two solutions which have, as you already know, two different concentrations of filtered and stabilised urine. It is fine if you don’t remember, we will do an episode of « Focus on » to talk in more details about this cool experiment, so stay tuned!

Maxime, our astronomer, also managed to find time to edit some observations we received from the telescope of New-Mexico during the night. He turned those observations of M-42, the object he made the telescope point at, into a really amazing picture. He will soon be able to explain you better than me his work as an astronomer in the next episode of « Interview with ».

But today it’s François’ turn! Let’s see what we talked about this afternoon in the RAM!

“-Hi François how are you? Can you introduce yourself for those who don’t know you yet?

-Yes sure! I am 21 years old, I am a student in aerospace engineering at Supaero, in France. I am currently doing a double degree in engineering physics at KTH, an engineering school in Stockholm, Sweden. In my curriculum, I also did an internship at the German Space Agency (DLR) on the optimization of rocket trajectories. And apart from my curriculum, I really like climbing and mountaineering.

-Ok cool! So, in the crew you are the Engineer, can you explain what does that means?

-My role is divided into 3 parts. The first consists of daily checks of the functioning of the station. We try to live as much as possible on our own resources or at least in the short circuit which implies having a total trust in the devices that surround us. I therefore check the water level every day in the tanks, the production of electricity, the level of charge of the suits and rovers, the filling of the toilets…
Then I have to fix everything that misbehaves in the station. A poor quality of water or air involves a change of filters… Right now, I work on the batteries of the suits that seem to work badly. I have access to the RAM (Repair and Assembly Module) where many devices are at my disposal to try to adjust these problems (multimeter, soldering iron…). But let me reassure you, most of the time, the station is fully functional.
Finally, and this is the part I prefer, I help other crew members in their personal experiments. I had to repair a 3D printer with Maxime for his experiment, help Julie make a water recycling system…

-Wow this is cool! And what is your favourite part of the job?

-My favourite part is without hesitation the last of which I have just talked to you about, the one where I help the others in their experiments. The repair of the 3D printer is in particular a good memory. We spent 2 days with Maxime to disassemble and repair it, replace defective parts and see it again functioning was very satisfactory.

-And is there something you don’t like in your job?

-What I like the least in my activities may be the repetition of my activities with all the daily checks that are repeated and especially the emptying of the toilet. However, it is necessary so I do it with a good heart (and I especially hope that the crew will get me a burger after the mission for all the times I emptied the toilet). I think that the feeling of being useful to the crew and to a smooth running of the mission is an increasingly important motivation for me, as the mission advances. Indeed at the beginning of the mission, it is the excitement that motivates, realizing new tasks being always enjoyable. But the more the mission is moving, the more important it is to have a lasting motivation for the daily tasks.

-We will definitely offer you a burger when we come back on Earth, you deserve it! On a more personal subject, why did you choose to participate in a MDRS mission?

-I chose to participate in this analogue mission to approach even more the field of space exploration. During the 2 years of preparation, I had to discuss with many researchers, inquire about inhabited flights and Martian exploration missions … It was very beneficial for me. I also think that this mission is a good way to help the research at our level. We participate in experiments of laboratories on human factors which study our psychological and physiological evolution during the mission. I hope the data gathered will be relevant and will help them in their work.

-I hope too! Thank you very much for your time, it was a very cool interview and thank you one more time for the work you do every day in the station!”

That’s it for the interview with our Engineer, I hope you enjoyed it! Remember that next time it will be Maxime’s turn so stay tuned!

Journalist Report – February 10th

Sol 10: A day in a Martian’s life – What do we do every day on Mars?

Author : Pierre Fabre

Hi everyone welcome back! Today is a special report! I am going to describe the best I can what we do on a typical day (or Sol) on Mars! I hope you will enjoy this format !

7:10 – You wake up in your small individual room and turn on the light. On Mars you don’t stay in bed chilling on your phone because your HSO is waiting for you downstairs for the morning workout and moreover as there is no internet there is nothing to do on your phone. So, you get up and put on your sport clothes. You leave your room and say good morning to your crewmates who are little by little joining you at the upper deck. You hydrate a powder orange juice and drink it to give you some energy for the workout. Then you go downstairs where Julie is already installing the mats on the floor and taking care of the music.

7:30 – The workout starts. Some are still sleepy and some others like Julie are already full of energy! You start by a warmup with some running on the spot, jumping jacks, high knees, and butt kicks

Then you start the real workout:

-Legs: squats, squat holds, squat jumps, lunges, burpees… (I’m not going to lie, those exercises hurt but it kind of feels good after)

-Abs and back: crunches, knee to elbow, heels touching, superman, plank, flutter kicks

-Upper body: curl ups with resistance bands and push-ups

-Sometimes you also do some cardio training like air boxing

Then you stretch for a while. You stay with Julie to clean the lower deck while Marion goes to the GreenHab to water the plants and the others go up to start preparing the breakfast. You are lucky, your Commander likes to prepare pancakes for everyone.

8:00 – Breakfast! Everyone has their routine for breakfast. Some eat cereals, others pancakes or oats. You talk with your crewmates about the workout and about the incoming day and in the meantime, you complete the questionnaire about sleep for Marion’s experiment.

8:40 – Breakfast ends. You clean the table with your crewmates and go back to your room to prepare for the day.

9:00 – EVA briefing! The big map of the MDRS is on the table and the EVA leader of the day explains the destination, the objectives, who is your buddy, which rover you will take, who will be the HabCom and finally the timeline of the EVA.

9:10 – The briefing is over and you go to the lower deck with the others to suit up, test your radio, put your EVA shoes on, put what will be needed for the EVA in the airlock and go through the checklist with the HabCom.

9:25 – You step into the airlock with your crewmates. Then you wait 5 minutes until the depressurisation is over. Sometimes your HabCom puts some music in the radio, it makes the waiting funnier.

9:30 – Your HabCom gives the green light, you step out of the airlock, you are outside, on Mars. The EVA can start. You go to the rover you’ve been assigned to and give the battery data of the rover to the HabCom.

The EVA can be an exploration EVA (like the one at the Moons or at Candor Chasma) or an EVA related to an experiment like the one we did today at North Ridge for the drone mapping experiment. By the way, it was really cool and I think I definitely broke the record of number of ascents of North Ridge in 1 hour!

For the sake of storytelling, let’s stay you leaves the station for a 3 hours and a half long exploration EVA.

In the meantime, those who stay at the Hab monitor the temperature in the GreenHab and open the door if it is too warm in it. They also work on their experiments, perform tasks for human factors experiments or start writing their reports. If the journalist is there, he can also take that opportunity to interview the other crew member. They also have to cook something good for lunch to feed the starving explorers.

12:55 – You come back with your crewmates from the long but incredible exploration EVA! Your back hurts a little, you are thirsty, tired and you smell bad but you are so happy because it was an amazing EVA and you can’t wait to tell everything you saw to your crewmates who stayed at the Hab. You ask your HabCom the permission to enter the airlock and finally step into it for pressurisation.

13:00 – Pressurisation is over. You enter the lower deck and your crewmates help you take off your spacesuit and you start telling them about the EVA even if you still have your helmets and they can’t hear a word of what you say. Then you go upstairs where it smells so good thanks to your wonderful crewmates.

13:10 – Debriefing and lunch. The EVA leader does a short debriefing about what went well and what didn’t. Every member of the EVA including you gives a short summary of how they felt and then the crew can finally start to eat! You thank a thousand times the cooks for their job in between two stories of the EVA you just did.

14:00 – The kitchen is being cleaned and you are answering another questionnaire for another human factors experiment. This time the experiment comes from the University of Bourgogne and the questionnaires are between 5 and 15 minutes long. When it is done, you take a break on the couch to talk with your crewmates while others, tired by the EVA, take a short nap in their room.

15:00 – Start of the afternoon’s activities.

These can change a lot depending on the day.

Sometimes, if it is your turn, you will have to perform some tasks for a human factor experiment. Today, it was TELEOP and the experiment created by the University of Lorraine (with the famous « shapes test » which is currently my number one nightmare).

If not, you will be able to work on your experiments or do the job related to your role. On a typical day, on our crew:

-François goes to the RAM to repair things (like our spacesuits) or helps other crew members on their experiments.

-Maxime goes to the Musk Observatory to observe the Sun or stay in the Hab to create beautiful pictures from observations made with a telescope in New Mexico.

-Marion goes to the GreenHab to take care of the plants or to the Science Dome for the Aquapad experiment.

-Julie take care of the spirulina and soja in the GreenHab or goes to the Science Dome to recycle our water.

-Clément manage our planning for the next days or takes and photoshops pictures.

-And I, work on my drone experiment or start writing the report you are currently reading.

18:00 – Relaxation break! After an afternoon of hard work, your HSO organise a relaxation session. You sit on the upper deck’s floor with your crewmates and Julie guides the session while your eyes are closed and you think to nothing but your breathing.

18:30 – Reports time! You write your report for the day and the EVA request for tomorrow because you will be the EVA leader. Some crewmates are also writing their reports while others are debating next to Clement’s laptop on which photos to choose for today. Your journalist is in his room trying to find inspiration to finish his report in time.

19:00 – Beginning of the communication window. One person is behind the laptop exchanging with the MDRS staff and sending the reports. We also send them our questions and doubts. We start to receive their answers and their feedbacks on our reports and pictures. In the meantime, you start to cook a delicious recipe with one of your crewmates!

20:00 – Most of the reports are already sent (sometimes the journalist report takes a little bit longer) and you start to enjoy your dinner! Everyone congratulates you for the food. The person in charge of the communication window keeps an eye on the laptop in case we receive an email

21:00 – End of the communication window. You help your crewmates clean the kitchen while your journalist is translating his report in French for the website and the families.

21:30 – You sit at the table with your crewmates on which Julie is preparing a team-building game. You play, you try to cheat, you laugh and before you realise it, an hour has passed.

22:30 – You say good night to your crewmates and go to bed, tired by your amazing day on Mars. You need to sleep because tomorrow will be another unique day on Mars and moreover, it will be your first time as an EVA leader! You fall asleep really quick and start dreaming about what you saw during this Sol 10…

Journalist Report – February 9th

Sol 9: Focus on: Mars’ Atmosphere – LOAC, Mega-ARES, Purple Air, and weather station

Author: Pierre Fabre

Hi everyone! Welcome back to this new report! Today is a new episode of “Focus on”, our format in which we talk about the experiments we brought with us on Mars. In this episode, we are going to talk about several experiments we perform for the French center of scientific research that aim at gathering data about the air on Mars. This will surely be very interesting!

But before, as usual, let’s talk about what happened during this Sol 9 on Mars!

I have to talk to you about something. At MDRS, the toilet goes directly into a tank. One of the missions of Francois, our engineer, is to empty that tank when it is full. I can assure you that this is not a pleasure at all and for all of us, he is kind of the hero of this station. Since the beginning of the mission, we’ve noticed that he had to empty that tank way too frequently. This morning, the tank was full again and with the help of our Commander, they decided to finally address the problem.

They discovered that there was a solid part (yes, this is disgusting) at the bottom of the tank and that was the reason why the tank was getting full so fast. We will hopefully now be able to find a solution to this issue knowing the origin! We really owe them one on this one. When we will be back on Earth, we will definitely offer them a good Earthly burger to thank them for their courage and their devotion.

The EVA of this morning was dedicated to my experiment of 3D mapping with drones. Without spoiling what will be said in a future episode of « Focus on », this experiment aims, in short, at showing that having a 3D map while preparing your EVA’s itinerary makes you safer during the EVA and less tired at the end of it. Now that we know that drones can fly on Mars thanks to Ingenuity, it can be interesting to question their usefulness. A potential use can be to avoid Marsonauts taking useless risks or losing energy in vain on a hard path if a better path can be found by a drone.

For that purpose, I will compare how my crewmates perform at reaching the summit of North Ridge regarding whether or not they had the 3D map during their preparation. I already said too much but it will be clearer in the « Focus on » episode so don’t miss it!

So, as I was saying, this morning we went to North Ridge and reached its summit for the first time. It was a great moment and we were really happy to contemplate the Hab from the top of the same Ridge we see from the kitchen’s window. Tomorrow, the crew members that stayed at the Hab this morning will do the same ascent of North Ridge and then I will be able to analyse the data from the whole crew.

This afternoon, after all the energy he lost in the toilet’s tank this morning, Francois, our Engineer, and friendly neighbourhood hero, still managed to find the motivation to work on our spacesuits. In fact, some crew members noticed two or three days ago that the air cooling in their helmets was not as strong as at the beginning of the mission.

This can be a huge problem for physically demanding EVAs like the one we did this morning because during the effort the helmet fogs up and you lose your visibility. Losing your visibility means you might fail to see a rock on the floor and fall. I can assure you that falling during an EVA, with a heavy spacesuit on your back and the risk of breaking your helmet, is all you want to avoid!

After some tests, he discovered that the issue came from the batteries. Since yesterday, he has been performing tests on the batteries and on their chargers to find what was the issue and how to fix it. He is exchanging with the staff of the MDRS that gives him advice on what to do regarding the results of the tests he performed. He is getting close and we know he will succeed soon! Francois will soon have the opportunity to talk to you directly about his work at MDRS in an episode of « Interview with » dedicated to the Engineer so don’t miss it!

But now it is time to talk about science, it is time for the « Focus on »!

“-Ok Clément, so first, why did we bring those experiments with us?

-Well, we’re lucky enough at MDRS that the terrain and environment we work in resembles, in many ways, things we can expect to find on Mars. In particular, what we have here is a particularly arid environment, with lots of dust that can be kicked up by winds. So, this is a good testbed for the study of atmospheric phenomena we could expect to see there.

In particular, one of the atmospheric events that can have a big impact on a Martian mission is dust storms. They can get extremely large, and have an effect on the efficiency of solar panels, visibility on terrain, or also long-distance communications. This is why developing tools to study the presence and characteristics of this dust in the air, and the properties of the atmosphere during those events can be very useful for ensuring the safety of the first people to set foot on Mars. This is the main purpose of these experiments.

-Ok that’s cool! What is LOAC?

LOAC stands for Light Optical Aerosol Counter. This is a piece of equipment that was developed in an atmospheric sciences laboratory in Orléans, France, for the purpose of counting particles of dust in the air, their sizes, and the flow – this is very helpful to study the composition of dust storms. It’s been used in numerous campaigns not only on the ground but also in the upper atmosphere on high altitude balloons, and it’s even planned for a launch on a nanosatellite to ensure it is space ready for a potential launch to another planet!

-Ok, that first one is cool! And what is Mega-ARES?

-Mega-ARES is an instrument that measures the electric field in the air near the ground. There are many atmospheric events that can modify the electric field, and dust particles rubbing on one another can create electric charges in the air that can be measured by this very sensitive equipment. In the dust storms of Mars, we’re studying the possibility that large amounts of friction can cause electric currents in the air. So, when particles are heavy in the air and hit each other between the large antenna of the tool and the ground, or hit the antenna directly, it gets detected. While LOAC measures the types of particles in the air, Mega-ARES studies the influence these particles have on the low atmosphere.

Mega-ARES is the bigger, Earth-primed brother of Micro-ARES, which was a payload on the Schiaparelli lander designed by the European Space Agency, and that was scheduled to land on Mars around 10 years ago. Unfortunately, the lander failed when arriving on the Red Planet, and the researchers are hard at work trying to get it on a mission in the future. In the meantime, tests like those done at MDRS help gather data that shows how useful this sort of tool could be on Mars.

-Those experiments were both brought by previous Supaéro crews but this year we have a newcomer. What is Purple Air?

-PurpleAir is a tool for measuring air quality – this means it detects some particles that could be linked to human activity. It’s a very useful extra tool to have all the details we need for the other experiments. Both of them work better far away from human influence and will gain valuable data from knowing more about the composition of some of the particles in the air.

-And why is the weather station so important?

-The weather station is a great tool for double-checking our data – many experiments do their own measurements of temperatures and other data, but getting this specific information twice helps us make sure that there are no issues with the equipment. In addition to this, knowing wind speed and direction are important pieces of data to correlate with the measurements from the tool, for the obvious reason that high winds create dust storms, which are the important things we’re studying with these experiments.

As an aside, the station directly emits data to our receivers in the station, which helps us get live data about the outside conditions – and that’s been particularly helpful for those few times with high winds where, unfortunately, that station got knocked over!”

Okay, that’s it for this episode of “Focus on”! I hope you enjoyed it and that you learned something! I can’t wait for the next episode to tell you more about our experiments!

Crew 240 Journalist Report February 8th

Crew 240 Journalist Report

8-FEB-2022

Pierre Fabre

Sol 8: Interview with: Biologist – Why go on an Analog Mission?

Hi everyone welcome back for another episode of « Interview with ». Today we are going to talk with Marion Burnichon. She is the crew’s biologist but also the crew’s botanist as Raphael is sadly not there to take care of the GreenHab.

But before starting this exciting interview let’s talk about what happened during this Sol 8 on Mars!

After the incredible exploration of Candor Chasma last week, our crew was looking for a new zone to explore, a new destination. Julie, the EVA leader of the day, decided to go for an ambitious exploration: Moon Overlook. Ok let’s make this clear, we are still on Mars, but this particular zone is characterised by a gray sand that makes it look just like the Moon. I said ambitious because it is pretty far to the North of the Hab. They went as close as they could to the zone with Curiosity and Spirit (remember those are the names of the rover we drive at MDRS), but they still had to walk pretty far after that to reach the Moon Overlook. But what they found there was worth the efforts. They discovered the 5 famous Martian Moons: the Yellow Moon, the Gray Moon, the Beige Moon, the White Moon and last but not least, The Moon.

The pictures they managed to take before coming back are awesome and the place looks so cool, but unfortunately, with Marion, we stayed at the Hab to be able to rescue them if something happens. It was the second time for me but it is what it is, I had work to do for my drone experiment and I interviewed Marion so it was a good morning too.

Talking about the drone experiment, this afternoon I trained my crewmates to use the Pix4D software so that they will be able to use the 3D maps of North Ridge for tomorrow’s EVA (as promised in a previous report I will tell you more about this experiment in a « Focus on » episode so stay tuned).

This afternoon, after the training, Julie started her project of growing spirulina. Spirulina is a very interesting algae in the context of space food. Today she created the two solutions in which the Spirulina will grow. In both, she put an additional solution of stabilised and treated urine made by Toopi-Organics, a French startup. But in one of them, she put more than in the other. The objective is to analyse the effect of their urine-based solution on the growth of Spirulina. I personally can’t wait to see the results of that cool experiment which will be the subject of a « Focus on » episode!

In the meantime, Francois and Maxime, as usual, spent some time in the RAM to print a new 3D piece. This piece was needed for the experiment Mega-Ares which aims at measuring the magnetic field of Mars. We were supposed to install this experiment with the LOAC and the weather station but we needed a piece to assemble the mast with the base. At the time I am writing this the 3D printer is still at work and we all hope it will be a success so that we can schedule an EVA this week to finally install this cool experiment!

Ok, I think it is now time for me to show you what we talked about during Marion’s interview this morning!

– “Today, we are going to interview Marion Burnichon. Hello Marion, how are you?

– I’m good, how are you?

– Great thanks! So, Marion is our crew biologist, Greenhab officer and executive officer/vice commander and we are going to talk a bit about each role, about the MDRS mission, etc. Are you ready?

– Yes!

-So first, for people who may not know you, could you present yourself?

-Yes, so previously, I did a bachelor of science in Physics at McGill University and performed research in astrophysics. I realized that I would prefer sending telescopes or humans to space rather than study stars directly. So, I decided to get my Master’s degree in aerospace engineering at ISAE-SUPAERO. During this time, I did my research project in mission analysis for a CubeSat mission to the Moon. This allowed me to do an internship at Airbus in trajectory optimisation for resupply missions to the Lunar Gateway space station. Now, I work on the flight dynamics team at OneWeb, on a satellite constellation in low Earth orbit.

– Ok great! So now Marion, I would like for us to talk about your role on the crew. First, you were given the title of biologist. Can you tell us more?

– Yes, so the role of biologist is not a required role by the MDRS but is still an interesting one in this mission. Since it is not mandatory, the type of projects or experiments done under the umbrella of this role is quite large. In my case, I decided to have four experiments, one on sleep, another on water quality, a third on human factors, TELEOP, and the last one is in collaboration with Spacemedex on human physiology. In my case, with the duality of vice-commander, I interpreted this role as Crew scientist in addition to my experiments. This meant that I spent time with each member of the crew to look at their experiments to check that they were pertinent scientifically, useful for the mission and feasible in the MDRS. After that, I would also help, if they needed, to develop the scientific protocols.

– The role of vice-commander, we will talk about it later so first let’s talk about the role of Greenhab officer that you took up for this mission since our official Greenhab officer Raphael could not make it. How is it going?

– Yes, unfortunately, our Greenhab officer could not come with us due to visa issues and as I explained before, my role as crew biologist was not mandatory, so I officially took up the role of Greenhab officer as this one is required. In a sentence, I take care of the greenhouse and its plants. Every morning, after our sport, I go directly to the greenhouse and check the temperature to know if I should allow for cooler air to come in. I then water the plants immediately. The earlier I can do this, the better. It will allow the plants to absorb more water before it evaporates due to the heat. During the day, I will come back when I have time to harvest some vegetables or herbs for cooking. It gives us something fresh to eat. Generally, I also come back at night to water the plants when the temperature has dropped significantly.

– So, on top of these two roles that you took up for this mission, you are also executive officer/vice commander of the crew. What does this role entail?

– This role was important during the preparation of the mission considering we could not rely on our commanding officer as much during this phase. In this role, I organised different aspects of the mission trying to anticipate the tasks that had to be done and delegating or collaborating on different tasks with crew members. With my role of biologist, I was already very present in many of the experiments of the crew. Since I was treasurer of the Club, I was also present in all of the budgeting and sponsoring aspect of the mission. So it ended up being a role that came naturally before I was even nominated for it. I thought it was a hard role to take up because I often ended up taking hard decisions for the crew when our commanding officer wasn’t there to do it. For example, we had to take the decision to cancel the mission for 2021 because of COVID, this decision came from me and was hard to bring up/discuss during the meeting. The border for coming into the USA was still closed to Europeans and France had just put a ban for leaving the French territory. Some crew members still wanted to show up to the airport and see if we would get through but from the logistical side, that would imply putting ¼ of the budget at risk which was not a good idea. And from a human point of view, I believe that the deception of being turned away at the airport would have been huge and we could not have gone back for another year of preparation to come back in 2022 like we did. It was hard to take up this role and the responsibility it came with…

– It’s true that it was a hard decision to take because we had been working on this mission for a year and most of the crew still wanted to believe that we would make it, that the borders would reopen… But it is true that it was a good idea to stop earlier and to take a step back on this situation to be able to start another year of preparation. It was necessary. Marion, a more personal question, why did you want to participate in an MDRS mission?

– In an ideal world, I would like to work for a space agency to manage human spaceflight, work with astronauts on their journey or even calculate trajectories for human spaceflight. I decided to join the Club MARS and more specifically the MDRS mission because it was a unique chance to put myself in the shoes of an astronaut. It would allow me to try to understand what can be difficult and what can be problematic for crewed missions. It is important for me to understand this to be able to face and solve these problems better.

– That makes sense. Do you see yourself on the other side of the mirror as an astronaut?

– I have asked myself that question many times and I don’t know if I have the courage or the nerves to be an astronaut. These people are so calm under stress and I don’t know if I have that quality. But in the end, I have realised that it’s not as much the part of “being in space” that attracts me to being an astronaut. I would want to be an astronaut for the scientific aspect. I had a lot of trouble choosing between Physics, Chemistry and Biology in school and being able to work with researchers at the top of their field on different types of experiments is what blows my mind. The other part that interests me is communication. Just look at Thomas Pesquet, he has so much impact on the younger generation, on their education and on our world… I find it amazing that it comes from someone with a science background.

– Last question, what is your favourite part of the day?

– My favourite moment is the communications window that takes place between 7 and 9pm where we send our reports and our photos to the MDRS staff. Maybe, this is telling that I miss communicating with the outside world but having feedback on your work and reports is nice! Receiving a “I can’t wait to reading your next report”, “you took some really nice pictures today”, or “you are doing great work” is always nice to hear. Every day, we work and send reports to be put online on our website and our social media but without the MDRS staff, we have no feedback on our work. It is nice to have encouragements or congrats after a day of work!

– I agree with you! Alright so this interview is over, thank you so much for your time, it was really nice!

– Thank you for doing this!”

That is the end of this interview, a longer version will be uploaded on YouTube but I will tell you more about that later! In any case I hope you enjoyed this episode of « Interview with ». I personally really enjoyed doing it and I can’t wait for the next one which is coming soon! See you in tomorrow’s report which will be a « Focus on » so stay tuned!

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