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NASA Seeking Motivated Volunteers to Live on Mars

NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover snaps a self-portrait at a site called Vera Rubin Ridge on the Martian surface in February 2018. (NASA via Reuters)
NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover snaps a self-portrait at a site called Vera Rubin Ridge on the Martian surface in February 2018. (NASA via Reuters)
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NASA Seeking Motivated Volunteers to Live on Mars

NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover snaps a self-portrait at a site called Vera Rubin Ridge on the Martian surface in February 2018. (NASA via Reuters)
NASA’s Curiosity Mars Rover snaps a self-portrait at a site called Vera Rubin Ridge on the Martian surface in February 2018. (NASA via Reuters)

NASA is seeking “highly motivated individuals” to live in 3D-printed simulated Mars habitats as it prepares to send humans to the Red Planet as soon as 2037. NASA said it is looking for a few good men and women to help it progress in its plan to send humans to Mars by 2037.

According to The Daily mail, the US space agency is seeking “highly motivated individuals” to participate in year-long Mars surface simulation, where they will live a 1,700-square-foot module 3D-printed by ICON, called Mars Dune Alpha.

The program consists of three simulations, with the first starting in 2022, and each will see four crew members spend the 365 days completely isolated in the mock habitats of the Red Planet.

The habitat will simulate the challenges of a mission on Mars, including resource limitations, equipment failure, communication delays, and other environmental stressors, NASA shared in the announcement.

Crew tasks may include simulated spacewalks, scientific research, use of virtual reality and robotic controls, and exchanging communications. The results will provide important scientific data to validate systems and develop solutions. Applications have opened and will run through September 12, 2021.

Those interested in participating must be within the ages of 30 to 55, possess a master’s degree in a STEM field and have at least two years of related professional experience.

Individuals will have to pass the NASA long-duration flight astronaut simulation and are required to have a COVID-19 vaccination, reads the application website. But they won’t end up going to the actual Red Planet when a mission, with that honor initially reserved for highly-trained astronauts.

The habitats will be constructed at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, and will include workstations, medical facilities and a place to grow food. The missions aim to provide valuable insights and information to assess NASA’s space food system, as well as physical and behavioral health and performance outcomes for future space missions.

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Jane Austen Fans Celebrate the Author’s 250th Birthday in Britain and Beyond

One of the new British 10 pound notes is posed for photographs outside the Bank of England in the City of London, Thursday, Sept. 14, 2017. (AP)
One of the new British 10 pound notes is posed for photographs outside the Bank of England in the City of London, Thursday, Sept. 14, 2017. (AP)
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Jane Austen Fans Celebrate the Author’s 250th Birthday in Britain and Beyond

One of the new British 10 pound notes is posed for photographs outside the Bank of England in the City of London, Thursday, Sept. 14, 2017. (AP)
One of the new British 10 pound notes is posed for photographs outside the Bank of England in the City of London, Thursday, Sept. 14, 2017. (AP)

Fans of Jane Austen celebrated the acclaimed author's 250th birthday on Tuesday with a church service in her home village, festive visits to her house — and a virtual party for those paying tribute from afar.

Thousands of enthusiasts around the world have already taken part in a yearlong celebration of one of English literature’s greats, who penned “Pride and Prejudice," “Sense and Sensibility” and other beloved novels.

On Tuesday — to mark 250 years since she was born on Dec. 16, 1775 — Jane Austen’s House, in the southern English village of Chawton, hosted talks, tours and performances for dozens of visitors, with celebrations concluding with an online party for fans from all over the world.

“Regency dress strongly encouraged,” organizers said, adding that more than 500 people had signed up for the Zoom party.

The cottage, now a museum with Austen artifacts, was where the author lived for the last years of her life and where she wrote all six of her novels.

A church service featuring music and readings is held in Steventon, the rural village where she was born.

Fans, who call themselves “Janeites," have marked the anniversary year with Regency balls and festivals staged in the UK, US and beyond.

At the weekend, the city of Bath, where Austen lived for five years, hosted the Yuletide Jane Austen Birthday Ball, the finale of many grand costumed events held there this year.

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Thousands of Dinosaur Footprints Found on Alpine Cliffs Near Winter Olympics Site

The Director of the Stelvio Park, Franco Claretti, poses next to a reproduction of a dinosaur prior to a press conference in Milan, Italy, Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, on a discovery of thousands of dinosaur tracks at the Stelvio Park. (AP)
The Director of the Stelvio Park, Franco Claretti, poses next to a reproduction of a dinosaur prior to a press conference in Milan, Italy, Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, on a discovery of thousands of dinosaur tracks at the Stelvio Park. (AP)
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Thousands of Dinosaur Footprints Found on Alpine Cliffs Near Winter Olympics Site

The Director of the Stelvio Park, Franco Claretti, poses next to a reproduction of a dinosaur prior to a press conference in Milan, Italy, Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, on a discovery of thousands of dinosaur tracks at the Stelvio Park. (AP)
The Director of the Stelvio Park, Franco Claretti, poses next to a reproduction of a dinosaur prior to a press conference in Milan, Italy, Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, on a discovery of thousands of dinosaur tracks at the Stelvio Park. (AP)

Italian paleontologists have uncovered thousands of dinosaur footprints on a near-vertical rock face more than 2,000 meters above sea level in the Stelvio National Park, a discovery they say is among the world's richest sites for the Triassic period.

The tracks, some up to 40 cm wide and showing claw marks, stretch for about five kilometers in the high-altitude glacial Valle di Fraele near Bormio, one of the venues for the 2026 Winter Olympics in the northern region of Lombardy.

"This is one of the largest and oldest footprint sites in Italy, and among the most spectacular I've seen in 35 years," said Cristiano Dal Sasso, paleontologist at Milan's Natural History Museum in a press conference on Tuesday at the headquarters of the Lombardy Region.

Experts believe the prints were left by herds of long-necked herbivores, likely plateosaurs, more than 200 million years ago when the area was a warm lagoon, ideal for dinosaurs to roam along beaches, leaving tracks in the mud near the water.

"The footprints were impressed when the sediments were still soft, on the wide tidal flats that surrounded the Tethys Ocean," said Fabio Massimo Petti, ichnologist at MUSE museum of Trento, attending the same conference.

"The muds, now turned to rock, have allowed the preservation of remarkable anatomical details of the feet, such as impressions of the toes and even the claws," Petti added.

As the African plate gradually moved north, closing and drying up the Tethys Ocean, sedimentary rocks that formed the seabed were folded, creating the Alps.

The fossilized dinosaur footprints shifted from a horizontal position to the vertical one on a mountain slope spotted by a wildlife photographer in September while chasing deer and bearded vultures, experts said.

"The natural sciences deliver to the Milan-Cortina 2026 Games an unexpected and precious gift from remote eras," Giovanni Malagò, President of the Milano Cortina 2026 Organizing Committee told journalists.

The area cannot be reached by trails, so drones and remote sensing technologies will have to be used to study it.

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Another Home in British Village Torn Down Due to Seaside Erosion

The bulldozers have moved in to demolish The Chantry (ITV News) 
The bulldozers have moved in to demolish The Chantry (ITV News) 
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Another Home in British Village Torn Down Due to Seaside Erosion

The bulldozers have moved in to demolish The Chantry (ITV News) 
The bulldozers have moved in to demolish The Chantry (ITV News) 

Demolition work has begun on a second clifftop home in a picturesque seaside spot, just weeks after another property was knocked down in the village.

Bulldozers have started tearing down The Chantry, in Thorpeness on the Suffolk coast because of its proximity to the crumbling cliff edge, according to ITV News.

The four-bedroom home on North End Avenue was put up for auction in September, selling for £200,000, according to the agents' website.

But East Suffolk Council said demolition had to begin after “critical safety levels” were reached.

At the end of October, neighbor Jean Flick, 88, saw her clifftop home in Thorpeness demolished after what the council described as “significant erosion.”

Evelyn Rumsby, who has lived in the village since 1977, described the latest demolition as “heartbreaking.”

“I don’t think unless you live here, you can’t experience anything like it... the noise of these lovely homes going,” she said, holding back tears.

“The erosion has been extreme over the last months, really extreme, and our only hope now is the shingle might come back if the winds change and we don’t have the intensity of these high winds that we’ve had over the last few months.”

“I do have fears,” she said. “We have to acknowledge that if it [erosion] moved in and this road went, there would be no access to our home site. It’s the access to the properties that is a big consideration.”

A spokesperson for East Suffolk Council said: “We have been working closely with affected property owners following significant recent erosion and sadly, critical safety levels have now been reached for another property on North End Avenue.”

He said demolition is in progress and we will continue to support the owners and their contractors to ensure the building can be taken down safely.

“This is a distressing situation, and we would request that people respect the owner’s privacy at this difficult time,” the spokesperson said.

“It is impossible to accurately predict when further losses may occur as erosion is not linear. Therefore, we are regularly monitoring the area and engaging with property owners on an ongoing basis.”