New Frontiers for humans on the Red Planet

Wanna go to the moon or Mars and never come back to Earth.  Yup ... that high can be achieved by people other than astronauts in about a decade or much less.



Rachel Martin at NPR:
Gardens on the moon. It sounds like a particularly whimsical children's book. But if NASA has its way, it might become more than a fantasy story. The space agency revealed plans this past week to grow a series of plants on the moon: basil, turnips and a little white flowered planet called Arabidopsis.....

Tanya Lewis writing at Space:
....Tens of thousands of people are prepared    to leave their families, jobs and lives behind for a one-way trip to Mars.
The Mars One mission aims to send humans on a one-way trip to the Red Planet. The mission aims to land the first Mars colonists on the planet by 2023. Applicants over the age of 18 from any country are eligible to apply, and Mars One has received more than 165,000 applications already. But what sort of person would go?
A few dozen of the aspiring Martians convened in Washington, D.C., in August for the "Million Martian Meeting." A panel of four applicants answered questions from the audience about their reasons for wanting to go to Mars without a return ticket.....