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00:00 On the Mars surface, this is a fuel cell.
00:03 A planet recreated in miniature, otherwise known as Mars in a sandbox,
00:10 with all the kit the astronauts will need on the surface,
00:13 including a brick-making machine and a reconfigured treadmill
00:17 to simulate the planet's lesser gravity.
00:20 Four volunteers will be living here for a year.
00:23 Part of the activities for a Mars mission would be,
00:26 with the geology and exploration, building and maintaining
00:30 that infrastructure for life on Mars.
00:34 For a quick tour around this 3D-printed dome,
00:37 there are four small bedrooms with supplementary TV and board games.
00:42 So now we're moving into the workspace.
00:45 It's a mini office with an attached robot station and two bathrooms.
00:51 Life will get tough for those chosen to take part.
00:54 We can have crew in isolation and confinement with Mars realistic restrictions,
01:00 and we can really start to understand how those restrictions
01:04 are associated with their health and performance over that year.
01:09 Food and even water will be restricted to watch how the volunteers perform
01:13 and how and if they actually get on with each other.
01:17 And they'll use a crop area to grow their own leafy greens.
01:20 They're also figuring out what samples and souvenirs they can get hold of.
01:24 What will we prioritise to bring back to Earth,
01:27 since payloads are always limited, and how much they can bring back.
01:31 And so this is another aspect of the work they'll be doing to be Mars realistic.
01:34 Three Mariner spacecraft have flown by Mars in recent years.
01:38 The search for life on the Red Planet has gone on for decades,
01:41 with the first successful space probe landing in the '70s.
01:46 Now, with Elon Musk's SpaceX joining NASA,
01:49 these space pods may become the hotels of the future.