TEP Talk: What’s In Your Mars Mission Kit?
Ever since the Perseverance rover’s successful Mars landing last month, the excitement around the possibilities of ancient life on the red planet have been abuzz among our community. The touchdown sparked our curiosity to see what our members would take on a 90-day mission to Mars (aside from essentials), so we caught up with the biomedical engineers and chemists at Technology Enterprise Park (TEP) about it during an early morning Coffee Talk.
The responses were delightfully creative, amusing, and endearing. “I would take Matt Damon, because he’s been there before. He’d know what to do,” joked Luba Groce, Quality Assurance Technician at VERO Biotech. “I’d also take an mp3 player and a book,” she added.
If given the opportunity, Groce wasn’t the only one who thought to take someone with them to Mars. A handful of our members requested their significant others for the trip as well. Aside from that, popular responses included sentimental items (like pictures of family) and things that reminded them of the comfort of home (like their favorite pillow). Unsurprisingly, devices like cell phones and iPads were the most common things they would take for entertainment. In fact, several members had a hard time thinking of two more items after deciding on their smartphone, iPad, or Kindle as their number one Mars mission kit essential.
TEP COMMUNITY RESPONSES: ITEMS IN THEIR 90-DAY MARS MISSION KIT
What three personal items would you take on a 90-day mission to Mars? Let us know in the comments below.
DID YOU KNOW?
NASA has named the landing site of the Perseverance rover “Octavia E. Butler Landing,” after the renowned African American science fiction author, Octavia E. Butler.