Building Shelter | How to Survive on Mars

When we get to Mars, we need to solve our basic needs, in particular protection from radiation. The first crew that lands on Mars will live in their ship, but you can't live there very long. The cosmic radiation and the solar radiation is going to penetrate the ship; you have to get underground quickly.

We now know there are certain regions on Mars that have an extensive underground network of lava tubes. This is where the volcanoes have existed for hundreds of millions of years, and as they died away, they actually became huge rooms. When we think about them in terms of human exploration, they could be an attractive place to consider. They provide a structure that is radiation proof.

You're in a huge underground cavern. You still have to have airtight hulls and stuff like that. It's not like it'll hold the air in, but it'll protect you from radiation, and it'll also protect you from temperature extremes. The trick is lava tubes are not so easy to find.

You see, they're underground. We're still in the process of figuring out those and mapping them is not a trivial thing. Now, we'd also want to create some other kinds of living spaces outside of the lava tubes. For instance, we want to have inflatable transparent domes lit by natural sunlight, and we can grow plants.

From my perspective, before any humans get to the surface of Mars, we are going to have sent in advance habitation with radiation shelters. You won't use an astronaut to do something as quote unquote menial as building a habitat. The final precursors will be an army of robots, and they'll begin to build the habitats.

I think about the technology we're developing today in 3D printing. Imagine being able to send a 3D printer to the Martian surface that pulls the soil out, adds some water, adds some binder, and is sitting there 3D printing shelters. And you've got your homes pre-built waiting for you right there.

Now, until such time in the rather distant future that Mars is terraformed, Mars will have a thin atmosphere. As a result, these things will have to be pressurized, and they can't be that big. They won't be miles in diameter, like the domes you see in science fiction, but domes 50 meters, 100 meters in diameter; these are entirely possible.

We will have to live in dome cities and wear space suits on Mars, you know, for a long time. But that's not to say that we can't have a really nice life. But it's not going to be an Earth life; it's going to be a Mars life.