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The invisible problem with sending people to Mars
We aren’t talking enough about cosmic rays.
Nelson pointed to evidence of changes to bone health, to the blood-brain barrier of the central nervous system, and to particular features in the eye as areas of open research. You could lessen the amount of time spent in space by using technology such as nuclear propulsion, which NASA is researching, but that carries its own risks — especially if something were to go wrong during a launch, as an explosion could scatter radioactive material into Earth’s atmosphere. Whether it’s the glittering Martian cities envisioned by Musk or, more realistically, a small group of explorers heading to Mars for periods of a few months to a few years before returning to Earth, the payoffs of sending people to another planet could be profound — we just need to be clear about the costs.
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