Fifty years ago this month, humans last set foot on the moon. Now the United States and other countries are gearing up to send people back again. This time, however, the moon is a stepping stone toward a bigger goal: putting humans on Mars.
Why Mars? As one of our closest planetary neighbors, Mars is within reach. Also, its surface seems to have once been similar to Earth’s, so scientists want to learn more about how Mars
NASA, the U.S. space agency, has teamed up with the Canadian, European, and Japanese space agencies to get humans to the moon by 2025. As part of the Artemis program, they plan to set up a
People who favor sending humans to the Red Planet say astronauts would be able to explore and analyze samples more efficiently than rovers and other remote devices.
Other people, however, say putting humans on Mars is not worth the health risks that astronauts would face traveling to and exploring that planet. They say we should focus on other space destinations instead.
Should we send humans to Mars? Two space scientists weigh in.