biology

Mars One

Mars One is a biology topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Mars One rather than just read about it. In short: Mars One was a small private Dutch firm that accepted money from investors planning to land the first humans on Mars and leave them there to establish a permanent human colony. From its announcement in 2012 until its bankruptcy in early 2019, it is estimated to have received tens of millions of dollars.

Key takeaways

Mars One belongs to biology; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Mars One to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Mars One from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Mars One was a small private Dutch firm that accepted money from investors planning to land the first humans on Mars and leave them there to establish a permanent human colony. From its announcement in 2012 until its bankruptcy in early 2019, it is estimated to have received tens of millions of dollars. Mars One was not an aerospace company and did not manufacture hardware. Mars One consisted of two entities: the not-for-profit Mars One Foundation, and the for-profit company Mars One Ventures which was the controlling stockholder of the for-profit Interplanetary Media Group that also managed the broadcasting rights. The Mars One Foundation, based in the Netherlands, managed the project. The company had four employees, and intended to make profits by selling media (documentaries) about the personnel selection, training and colonization. The first mission was estimated by its CEO Bas Lansdorp to cost about $6 billion. The concept was criticized by scientists, engineers, and those in the aerospace industry as glossing over logistics and medical concerns, and lacking critical concepts about hardware. The concept was called a suicide mission by academia, the spaceflight industry, and international news. On 15 January 2019, a court decision was made to liquidate the for-profit company, bankrupting it in the process.

Origin Mars One's original concept included launching a robotic Mars lander and Mars orbiter as early as 2020, to be followed by a human crew of four in 2024, and one in 2026 which would not return to Earth. Although the announcement garnered much international publicity, the concept was criticized by scientists, engineers, and people in the aerospace industry. Mars One was said to be very short on funding, lacking critical concepts about hardware, life support, electrical power supply, and was criticized as glossing over logistics, medical concerns, and protection against space radiation. The concept was called a suicide mission in academia, spaceflight, and international news. By February 2015, two conceptual studies were done by contractors. Despite the criticism and lack of funding, about 2,700 people applied to become one of the 24 finalists "to settle Mars".

Initial mission concept In December 2013, Mars One announced its concept of a robotic precursor mission. Originally scheduled for launch in 2020, the roadmap later called for the launch to occur in 2022. If funded, the robotic lander would be "built by Lockheed Martin based on the design used for NASA's Phoenix and InSight landers, as well as a communications orbiter built by Surrey Satellite Technology Limited." In February 2015, Lockheed Martin and Surrey Satellite Technology confirmed that contracts on the initial study phase begun in late 2013 had run out and additional contracts had not been received for further progress on the robotic missions. Plans were set in motion to raise the US$200 million needed to support the initial robotic mission, but some critics did not find the economic plans to raise money from private investors and exclusive broadcasting rights to be sufficient to support the initial, or follow-on, mission(s). Mars One selected a second-round pool of astronaut candidates in 2013. Mars One received interest from over 200,000 applicants for the first round. However, as candidate Joseph Roche asserted, the number of initial applicants who completed the application process was only 2,761, which Mars One later confirmed via YouTube video. The second-round pool was reduced to 705 candidates (418 men and 287 women) in the beginning of May 2014. 353 were removed due to personal considerations. After the medical physical requirement, 660 candidates remained. The third round of candidate selection concluded in 2015. The remaining 100 candidates, known as The Mars 100, consisted of 50 men and 50 women who were slated to move forward to the next round, where 40 individuals would have been chosen through an interview process. On 30 June 2014, it was made public that Mars One was seeking financial investment through a bidding process to send company experiments to Mars. The experiment slots would go to the highest bidder and would include company-related ads, and the opportunity to have the company name on the robotic lander that was proposed to carry the experiments to Mars in 2018. In a video posted on 19 March 2015, Lansdorp said that because of delays in funding the robotic precursor mission, the first crew would not land on Mars until 2027. Following the criticism reported in The Space Review in October 2016 about funding mechanisms, Mars One created Mars One Ventures. In late 2016 Mars One had changed its first crewed mission date to 2032.

2014 robotic lander

In December 2013, mission concept studies for a robotic Mars lander were contracted with Lockheed Martin for a demonstration mission concept. It would be based on the design of the successful 2007 NASA Phoenix lander, and provide proof of concept for a subset of the key technologies for a later human settlement on Mars. Upon submission of Lockheed Martin's Proposal Information Package, Mars One released a Request for Proposals for the various payloads on the lander. The total payload mass of 44 kg was divided among the seven payloads as follows:

Water extraction (10 kg) Soil acquisition (15 kg) Thin film solar power demonstrator (6 kg) Camera system (5 kg) Open for random proposals from the highest bidder (4 kg) Educational payload (2 kg) Winning university experiment (2 kg)

Further plans A robotic rover was proposed to be launched to Mars in 2022, in order to scout a landing site for the 2027 lander and a site for the Mars One colony. At the same time, a communication satellite would be launched, enabling continuous communication with the future landed assets. For 2024, six cargo missions were proposed, in close succession, consisting of two living units, two life-support units, and two supply units; a spacecraft transporting four astronauts was proposed to meet a transit vehicle bound for Mars. For 2025, the landing module transporting four astronauts was proposed to land on Mars. They envisioned the crew to be met by the rover, and taken to the Mars One colony.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Mars One

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Mars One claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In biology, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Mars One before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Mars One ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Mars One

In research: Mars One appears in biology research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Mars One in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Mars One is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2012 establishments in the Netherlands, 2019 disestablishments in the Netherlands, Cancelled missions to Mars, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Mars One outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Mars One in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Mars One means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Mars One out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Mars One in simple terms?

Why does Mars One matter?

Because it connects several biology ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Mars One?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Mars One.