NASA Working on Mars Menu 220
DevotedSkeptic writes in with a story about the work going into feeding astronauts on a mission to Mars. "The menu must sustain a group of six to eight astronauts, keep them healthy and happy and also offer a broad array of food. That's no simple feat considering it will likely take six months to get to the Red Planet, astronauts will have to stay there 18 months and then it will take another six months to return to Earth. Imagine having to shop for a family's three-year supply of groceries all at once and having enough meals planned in advance for that length of time. 'Mars is different just because it's so far away,' said Maya Cooper, a senior research scientist with Lockheed Martin who is leading the efforts to build the menu. 'We don't have the option to send a vehicle every six months and send more food as we do for the International Space Station.'"
Easy... (Score:5, Funny)
Easy... [e-monsite.com]
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Easier... [bbc.co.uk]
Warning: This product is not endorsed by the manufacture.
MREs (Score:5, Funny)
'nuff said [wikipedia.org]
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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I just wanted to point out the shelf life is 3 years (enough for the 2.5 planned years of a Mars mission).
It's an acquired taste.
If you have too cultured of a palate, and you're used to multi-course meals with palate cleansers [about.com] in between, you probably won't last a day with MREs, much less 21.
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You can live on MRE's indefinately, but one needs hookers, blow and ammo as essential supplements.
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Bah, MRE's are for pussies.
Mainstay 3600 calorie bar is less space than 1 MRE and counts as TWO meals. Enjoy your lemony doom for 180 days....
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Re:MREs (Score:5, Funny)
From the article you linked to:
21 days is a lot less than the several months of a Mars journey.
No, you read this wrong...
What that means is; it could take you up to 21 days to choke one of these things down.
Meal, Ready to Eat (Score:5, Insightful)
People in the military say that MRE is three lies in one acronym.
.
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and thats when they are being POLITE about it.
but anyway if the stuff is packed as components and Spices/Sauces things should not be to bad (but i would have one of the projects be growing herbs and such).
3 years of frozen meals is a lot harder than 3 years worth of groceries.
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No option to resupply? (Score:5, Insightful)
No option to resupply? I figured that We would be sending 2-4 tons of supplies to restock every 2-3 months. I mean, it's one thing to hop in the Soyuz capsule and retrograde burn back home, but at the rate things break on the ISS, I can't imagine less than two restocking missions being sent to the mars mission en route, with another set of supplies being sent down every 3 months while they're on the planet. Things break, people get sick, shit happens.
Re:No option to resupply? (Score:5, Insightful)
Problem is, the opportunity for a reasonable flight path to Mars is not always there. Windows can be small and far apart.
Re:No option to resupply? (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, a resupply module does not need a reasonable flight path, it just needs to be there in time for the astronauts to utilize it.
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That's what I was going to say. If leaving a little later means you get there a lot later then you'll be sending some of the shipments very close together, or even out of order, but it's not like food packets are going to notice some DNA damage.
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In this instance "reasonable" means "existing boosters can send a decently sized payload". It's not just about travel time, it's also (overwhelmingly) about delta-V requirements.
Re:No option to resupply? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:No option to resupply? (Score:5, Funny)
" Carry a year's worth onboard, and send an unmanned cargo pod ahead to park in Mars orbit."
Orbit? Put it on the ground, perhaps it will lure out the Mars-bears.
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Indeed. I thought one of the benefits of the plasma engine was the ability to send large payloads very slowly to a destination for almost peanuts, while astronauts could arrive there very quickly with almost nothing. The linch-pin is that you send the payloads a year or two before the astronauts launch, so they arrive at a similar date.
Re:No option to resupply? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm guessing that NASA has done the math and figured out that it's easier, and possibly cheaper, to send all the food up to LEO and then transfer it to Mars in one go along with the astronauts than it is to engage in multiple interplanetary transfers, each with an orbital rendezvous and risk of failure.
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And if the resupply ship has an incident that somehow prevents its contents from being usable if/when it arrives at the rendezvous, the burn to insert it into Mars orbit fails perhaps, what's the fallback plan going to be?
The same as before, according to some? I.e. suicide pills, or an equivalent like a gradual poisoning of the air administered by the mission captain.
Or just sell the TV/video rights to the next few weeks to the highest bidder. It should be interesting.
But anyhow, we can send ships well ahead of time and not send the flesh load until the supply ships have actually landed safely. It's not like the natives are going to raid and plunder them.
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I'm guessing that NASA has done the math and figured out that it's easier, and possibly cheaper, to send all the food up to LEO and then transfer it to Mars in one go along with the astronauts than it is to engage in multiple interplanetary transfers, each with an orbital rendezvous and risk of failure.
NASA is notorious for flubbing this particular math. If it comes to a choice between using a small vehicle frequently or a large massive, "cost plus"-expensive vehicle, then NASA tends to go for whatever benefits its contractors most of the time (that is, use the big vehicle).
The advantages of smaller vehicles operating more frequently, is a) they're cheaper per flight due to economies of scale, and b) you can build up a lot of knowledge and experience for difficult tasks using low risk payloads.
For a
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Well, if you're sending the supply ship far enough out in advance, then just make sure it arrived intact (as in video feeds) before you send the people.
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No, the linchpin is that you send the supply ships ahead of the astronauts. The manned mission doesn't leave the ground till all the supply ships are safely in Mars orbit (o
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IANARS but what would be the benefit of sending supplies at regular intervals over sending them all at once. Energy cost will be the same.
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If Bob Kerman gets a penicillin resistant bacterial infection and needs a different type of antibiotic, or Jeb's body for some reason decided it is now lactose intolerant, they can change up the menu, throw in some new DVDs from the summer, include more fuel, spare parts... all sorts of things. Or someone needs an emergency appendectomy, and suddenly there are no more spare bags of blood or anesthetics on board for the next two years. When you go traveling on earth and you realize you forgot to pack sunscre
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For gods sake don't let them use JIT!!!
Poop steak (Score:3)
Might it be time to dig out the poop steak hoax and turn it into the real thing?
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Might it be time to dig out the poop steak hoax and turn it into the real thing?
You're joking, but with a crew of 6-8 people, and a flight time of 180 days, we're talking around 1200-1600 kg of feces. Urine will be recycled, but contain solids too, so add around 100 kg there.
Then there are the extra female hygiene challenges. While certainly not PC, it might be easier to just say no, and only accept women if they've had hysterectomies or are on period suppressing medication.
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...only accept women if they've had hysterectomies or are on period suppressing medication.
Not that controversial. They better be on the (period suppressing) birth-control pill. You don't want any babies getting conceived on the journey.
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That doesn't follow. There are many other ways to deal with fertility, including sterilization (of either gender) and implants.
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we will be leaving a trail of turds in space to mars. do you think they will carry it there and back?
And will doubtless become extinct (Score:2)
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Did you just crawl from under a rock? I can see I'm going to have to spell this out for you, but do you really think that male astronauts (or sailors, or oil rig workers) manage to go for extended periods without getting intimate with one of their hands? Just because the subject isn't exactly widely discussed outside the inhabitants of single-male communities, doesn't mean it doesn't happen. If that little disposal problem can be coped with, periods should be the least of anyone's worries.
Sigh. Yes, you have to spell it out for me, because I don't see how men need pads or tampons, neither of which can be processed through human waste recycling like feces, urine and semen.
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I don't get people's fascination with having humans on planets.
Your parents obviously were OK with this, or you wouldn't be on this one.
I think humans have a built-in desire to explore and move to new grounds, and that this has served us well in surviving. If we all stayed put in one area, it would only take a single catastrophe to wipe the entire human race out.
This drive may serve us well in the future too. When (not if) humanity on Earth faces its demise, whether from a comet, lab-engineered virus or other, we better have spread out.
If we put any value in the surv
Here's a plan (Score:3)
On the way back, Soylent Green for dinner.
Just an idea...
Mars menu (Score:2)
has too many calories [wikipedia.org]
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Mars-calories
Send food in advance maybe? (Score:5, Insightful)
Is there any reason a whole lot of canned/freeze-dried food couldn't be sent to Mars in advance? Now that we can target Mars with pretty much pin-point accuracy (within a few dozen KM) there's no reason a bunch of supply missions couldn't be sent before the fleshbots arrive.
We herald in (Score:3, Funny)
I'll be back after a short break. Don't go changin'.
Why can't you send supply ships... (Score:2)
Unmanned supply ships, why not?
You managed to land a car on mars ffs.
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sounds like a modern day re-run of the supply problems of the Terra Nova Expedition [wikipedia.org] in 1920 that ended up killing Scott and his team on the return journey from the pole.
Re:Why can't you send supply ships... (Score:4, Funny)
You managed to land a car on mars ffs.
Good point, landing a hot dog stand can't be that much harder.
Victorian canned food (Score:2)
No, storage is easily solvable
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given a good enough "crate" the problem is like you said FINDING the crates when they are needed. Do you really want to risk telling somebody that they have found Christmas Dinner (but the bad news is its 3 weeks away).
The Only way this would work is
1 the Food gets sent into Mars Orbit (and has multiple beacons on it)
2 you send multiple pods and hope the errors average out (you have a drop zone about of plus or minus a weeks travel and hope you miss in equal directions)
3 you drop the astronauts where the fo
Wont it make them sick?? (Score:2)
What's so hard about that? (Score:2)
Send them waffles and bacon!
Oh, and always promise them cake, but never give it to them.
Not hard to do. (Score:5, Insightful)
You want calorie dense nutrient dense foods. I can fit in a single backpack all the food needed by one person for 30 days. Problem is they will go insane eating the same ration day in and day out.
The other aspect is also choosing foods that have a higher conversion factor so the waste elimination is compact and less frequent. You cant go high protein as you have a limited supply of water and you have to have water to process protein. So it 's a balance that is hard to figure out.
The article summary is very wrong, " Imagine having to shop for a family's three-year supply of groceries all at once and having enough meals planned in advance for that length of time." is really easy. Imagine having to shop for a family's three-year supply of groceries all at once and having enough meals planned in advance for that length of time that dont use too much water from your finite limited supply of water and reduces the excrement output of the entire family to be as small as possible.
THAT is what NASA is trying to do, it's massively harder than planning a 3 year grocery list.
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So you are telling me they can figure this out a month before launch? Why dont you send them your resume' as it seems you are a lot smarter than the scientists that work there. Nahh dont do any testing and trials, just guess and push the launch button!
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So you are telling me they can figure this out a month before launch?
Actually, yes they could with off the shelf stuff such as vacuum bagging and freeze drying. There might be a modest degree of inefficiency in terms of mass using tools not intended for space flight. Frankly, the critical issues are experience with manned deep space flight and extended duration missions, developing a vehicle or vehicles that can travel to and land on Mars, and development and deployment of Mars-side infrastructure. NASA has a vast amount of experience with storing food in space.
There isn'
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"gets plenty of money"
No, the Pentagon gets plenty of money. We're talking about space exploration. There is no "gets plenty of money" considering the modest goals we can imagine with current technology and the range of missions that can be achieved. I'm not sure why you think "gets plenty of money" is appropriate considering the the kinds of things NASA could do with a real budget and considering the kinds of goals that are out there.
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Stupid person doesn't understand how much things cost, complains about money. News at 11
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I read somewhere that dog food experts were consulted about how to minimize poop from food. Apparently, dog food already has the quality of getting your dog full while minimizing poop generation. But they were questioning whether or not astronauts would appreciate their food being associated with the makers of Alpo or whatever.
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"That pretty much destroys your entire argument I believe.", only to the armchair drive by commenter it looks that way.
There is not 100% water recovery. that is completely impossible unless we are using star-trek unobtanium technology. They still resupply the ISS with water on every resupply launch. A MARS mission will have no resupply launches, and the cost per pound if they even though of a resupply launch would be 9,000X more expensive than lifting it to low orbit for the ISS. So if you screw up and
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There is not 100% water recovery.
WTF? Water recovery is an absolutely trivial technology. It is most definitely not impossible.
One does not simply exercise reading comprehension.
Yes, one does. One totally does. Except you.
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Ok, I did a lot of reading recently on the water pruifications system on the ISS. Astronauts need about 9 pounds of water a day. ~3 pounds gets reclaimed in urine, ~5 pounds from their breathing and sweat with a recovery rate of 97% overall.
They lose 3% of the water budget to solid waste, NASA said that they'd need a bigger system to make reclaiming the solid wastes practical.
If this is a near term project I'd take the proven system from the ISS, so take your astronauts x 9 pounds a day to get your water da
Imagine... (Score:3)
Imagine having to shop for a family's three-year supply of groceries all at once and having enough meals planned in advance for that length of time.
Then forget that idea, because it's nothing like that.
Stupid (Score:3, Funny)
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is not so hard (Score:2)
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Note:
The should be able to put a costco in orbit (Score:2)
Sending people to mars is one thing. You schedule it to take the shortest route. But sending equipment and supplies is different. They should be sending supplies for 10 years prior to the mission.
The hard part is getting the stuff into orbit. Then you blast it on any convenient trajectory available. You don't have to go very fast at all. In fact you want it to have plenty of fuel when it gets there so that it can park itself in orbit and then be brought down anywhere on the planet using probably the bumper
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The food will super freeze so it might be necessary to make a reverse fridge to insulate the food and keep heat inside the storage compartment
You insulate the compartment with aerogel, and the same power source used to run the mission (an RTG, hopefully) is used to operate heaters once on the ground.
It would certainly be interesting to see how cheeses behaved in space.
This is the problem (IMO) (Score:2)
Not be Mr negativity, but this is some of the reason why many say that NASA is becoming a failed experiment not worthy of federal funding. I don't mean to discount what they do and what they have done. But sometimes, they spend far more effort engineering than actually producing which is what makes it really hard to secure public buy-in over time.
You can re-supply a mission to the planet, you can accomplish many things but NASA's model of 6 years development for a 20 year mission isn't closing the gap fas
Molded Protein (Score:2)
All they need is a good supply of molded protein [wikiquote.org]. With a little ingenuity, you can even make a birthday cake out of it!
Why not send a vehicle every six months? (Score:2)
Seriously. Wouldn't it make sense to launch several unmanned "shipping containers" of food and supplies well ahead of the manned craft, set to land near the proposed landing site, and to continue to send such craft during the mission timeline? (I'm aware that Earth and Mars are both in motion and travel times vary, but given the long run-up to a manned mission, there would be a lot of viable windows to launch such "advance craft".) Make plans for at least one, if not more, such launches during the on-ground
Odd Claim in Article (Score:3)
TFA:
Can anyone suggest to me why powdered milk, and freeze-dried or liquid nitrogen frozen meat would not last for the three year voyage? One vendor freeeze-dired meat entrees claims they last 7 years: http://www.mtnhse.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=M&Category_Code=MHDL [mtnhse.com]
Is there some constraint that they are not telling us about?
Day 76 (Score:5, Funny)
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Spoiler alert (Score:3)
It's a Bugblatter of Trall cookbook, partly plagairized from How to Serve Pork.
Re:It won't happen anyway (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude...
Every single astronaut is close to your definition. They sit on top of some megatons capable explosive fuel and light that candle, hoping to get back in home without being burned on the re-entrance.
Why?
Because they think that there's things more important than their lives.
Never underestimate the human being. Not all of us are selfish bastards.
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I get your point, but I think you romanticize it too much. It's not like they are going over a trench in WW1 to save the man beside them, knowing for a fact that, short of some miracle, they will die. Astronaut death rate is only about 7.5% (34 deaths per 450 visitors to space)-- and I imagine it is only getting safer. They become astronauts because the thought of going into space is sweet, it pays lots of money, gives you lots of glory, and in some case, lots of fame. Astronauts compete with many other men
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On the other being, being you one of the selfish bastards, rest assured I'm keeping you correctly accounted.
Re:It won't happen anyway (Score:5, Interesting)
Until a propulsion method is invented that can get humans to mars and back in a few weeks the whole premise is ridiculous. No SANE person is going to volunteer to spend a year in a capsule with 18 months on a dust ball with an unbreathable atmosphere and lethal UV radiation. Sure, you'll find some volunteers but I guaranteed they'll all be mentally unbalanced and would probably chicken out at the last moment anyway. And don't anyone compare it with old sailing ship voyages - its nothing like that. On a ship you have gravity, fresh air, you can go outside, stop off at places and even swim. The nearest analogy would be to the conditions the poor slaves were kept in on atlantic voyages down in the hold.
Well, perhaps count me as insane, as I would volunteer for such a trip to Mars in a heartbeat.
Well, if I had to spend a year long voyage to Mars trapped in a capsule the size of a phone booth I would be a little bit more upset and concerned, and there is no way I would travel to Mars in the Orion capsule alone and in free fall the whole way, but there are other ways to make the trip a little more reasonable.
As for comparing a trip to Mars with a voyage from London to San Francisco in the 19th Century or even just across the North Atlantic in the 17th Century, I think the analogy is pretty appropriate. No, you didn't just jump into the water whenever you felt like it (assuming that you could even swim... that was not even a common skill for most people of that era). Regardless, I think you are making too many excuses for why it won't work.
If you want to see at least one well thought out proposal in terms of how somebody has suggested a trip to Mars can happen, here is a video for you to look at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cx6cioPdPZQ [youtube.com]
For myself, I would prefer to travel to Mars in a NAUTILUS-X [wikipedia.org] spacecraft. There are propulsion methods for getting to Mars that are effective in cutting that trip down to just a few weeks like you are suggesting, but most of them involve nuclear energy as an energy source of some kind. There are so many anti-nuclear nuts that complain each time NASA sends up a radioisotope thermoelectric generator (usually called simply an RTG) that assembling a full fledged nuclear reactor in space would be seen as public enemy #1 and would kill any attempt to even try. These same idiots would likely complain even if it was a nuclear fusion reactor instead, as that dreaded "nuclear" word would be used still. The trick for travel to Mars quickly is to simply have a high density energy source. Mars is just on the edge of what you can do with chemical energy in terms of using things like liquid oxygen and something else like hydrogen or methane. That is the reason why it takes so long to travel to Mars.
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What would you do for mental stimulation for a year?
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Submarine duty is a better comparison, two to three months without surfacing is typical.
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And don't anyone compare it with old sailing ship voyages - its nothing like that.
Except that, well, it is like that. You can have fresh air and artificial gravity on the spaceship as well. You can get outside. And they're going to stop off at Mars and Earth.
People have done this sort of thing for centuries perhaps even millennia, but it's all supposed to be different now because it's in space.
No SANE person is going to volunteer
Uh huh. That's a remarkably ignorant statement. There's never been a shortage of SANE volunteers for manned spaceflight.
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In space, nobody can hear you scream.
And that's different how? Keep in mind no one can hear you scream in a storm either. Or if you're adrift alone.
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Go on then hero, give NASA a call and put your name down.
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so you lead a very sheltered safe life and have a very narrow view of what 'sane' is. You probably would become mentally unbalanced in dire or stressful situation. Meanwhile, there are plenty of tougher sane people who would do the job well with perfect mental health.
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people have stayed in space for a year. plenty of those "flyboys" you admire have volunteered to do more. And like those in the "tin can" known as the ISS, they wouldn't be alone. Sane people do important dangerous work
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"I, for one, would definitely consider doing it if not to get off this dirtball planet."
Right, because Mars is a tropical paradise. Oh , wait...
Too many problems with humans as it stands, anyway. Give me all the video games, movies, tv shows and music that I want as well as companionship and I'll really think about it."
Yeah , course you would. Now hurry up, your mum is calling you for supper.
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Airline Catering add extra salt and spices to meals to avoid people complaining about them being too bland. When flying in high altitudes, apparently sense of taste and smell is impaired.
Could be similar issue in 0-grav and certainly is if cabine-pressure is kept low.
Re:Lack of gravity stops smell and taste? (Score:5, Informative)
"the lack of gravity means smell - and taste - is impaired. So the food is bland."
Really.
How come nobody else reading Slashdot noticed this ludicrous statement? How can a lack of gravity "impair" smell? Do they mean the SENSE of smell or taste? What are they talking about?
This is correct. Your sense of taste and smell is diminished in zero G. You start slopping on the hot sauce pretty heavily.
Also you start to notice a sweet, metallic smell everywhere you go.
They haven't quite figured out why this happens yet, but since we are essentially big bags of water, and in zero G our internal fluid pressure changes, that may upset the way fluids move through our mucosa.
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Probably the a similar thing to what happens on airplanes: http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/10/14/revealed-why-airline-food-tastes-so-bland/ [time.com]
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Devout Mormons are instructed to store away a year's worth of food and necessities. Here in Salt Lake City, Utah, there are numerous stores that cater to this. I wonder what NASA could learn from them. Some stores sell a complete [Freeze Dried] year's worth of food prepackaged, and variety is a big selling point. (And they have various options at various at various prices depending on the variety and quantity you want. (Or buy one of their grain grinders and some grain to mix it up a bit.)
So, NASA could just mail order three one-year packages per person, and be done with it.
So Mitt Romney will get us to Mars first? Color me confused :)
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So Mitt Romney will get us to Mars first? Color me confused :)
Sending Mitt Romney to Mars: Brilliant plan! The benefits to the economy will even outweigh the cost of the trip
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Devout Mormons are instructed to store away a year's worth of food and necessities.
Here in Salt Lake City, Utah, there are numerous stores that cater to this.
I wonder what NASA could learn from them.
Absolutely nothing. NASA already knows much more than they do about preserving food. They also already know something about what kind of nutrients will be needed. The Mormons also have the luxury of pantries.
So, NASA could just mail order three one-year packages per person, and be done with it.
If cost were no object, that would make sense. They'll save more be optimizing foodstuffs. I wonder if they have looked into chia seed, goji berries, and other so-called "Superfoods"? I'd guess yes, but I'm not going looking.
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I have no idea why a Mormon would need to stash food, it was a reasonable question. The second point was just musing about motives, hardly 'anti-Mormon' unless you have a huge chip on your shoulder.
As for the scores, I can't help the original having 0 - it's posted as AC so that's going to happen.
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