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Robert Wilson stepped foot inside the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) facility with just a bag of clothes, some headphones and a journal. He looked around his new home—a 650-square-foot closed habitat with two narrow floors and one small loft.

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Robert Wilson (PhDMechEngr'20) and his fellow crew members during the 45-day simulated mission to Mars.

Wilson, a PhD graduate from the��Paul M. Rady Department of Mechanical Engineering, was living every child’s dream. For the next 45 days, he and a team of three crew members from around the world were embarking on a simulated mission to Mars.

Their NASA-sponsored mission was simple: live and work like an astronaut. But life in the deep space domain isn’t as glamorous as it seems, even if it’s just a simulation.��

“When the door was sealed shut behind me, things got real, fast,” Wilson said.

The HERA research habitat, housed at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, is one of the country’s premier locations for isolation and confinement research. Scientists across the nation use HERA studies to analyze the effects of deep space on human health and performance.��

One day, insights gathered from HERA simulated missions could help guide the development of new, innovative strategies aimed at helping astronauts overcome challenges and perform complex tasks while in space. Maybe it’s a series of models that can predict an astronaut’s levels of stress and fatigue, or inform crew dynamics so they can work better as a team.

For Wilson, maybe it’s something more than that. Think of TARS, Matthew McConaughey’s robot companion in the movie��Interstellar, who uses a vast bank of knowledge on human behavior to assist the crew during their cosmic mission.

“There’s a lot left on the table when it comes to studying and using biometric data,” said Wilson. “The goal is to provide artificial intelligence systems with better data on humans to help them make more informed decisions.”

Experiencing space without ever leaving the ground

Wilson, currently a senior researcher at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland, received his PhD from CU Boulder in 2020. His research focused on analyzing and modeling one of the hardest populations in the world to work with: people.

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Wilson standing in front of the HERA facility.

“I was mostly interested in biometric data—how we can use it to answer questions and inform our decisions,” Wilson said. “But it’s the human element that makes it difficult. People are ‘squishy’ and engineering with ‘squishy’ things is very hard. Not all things are generalizable across all people, and being able to solve problems in this space relies on our ability to gather reasonable and consistent data about how humans behave or perform.”

There are other variables, such as environment, that make collecting human data more difficult, as well. Few humans have experienced the isolated no-man’s-land that we call outer space, and the data we have collected is too little to represent the infinity and beyond.

That’s why Wilson and others are choosing to take matters into their own hands as research volunteers at the HERA facility in Houston.

“When I was researching the HERA facility and learning what it takes to be a test subject, I realized that I fit all of the requirements. I could be data,” said Wilson. “So I applied just to see what happens. I got accepted, I went through physical evaluations, psychological evaluations and was lucky enough to be selected for the simulated Mars mission.”

Wilson and his fellow crew members familiarized themselves with the habitat, completing a few weeks of training before the real mission was set to begin in November. They needed to be prepared to handle communication delays as they “approach” Mars, maintain life support systems aboard the analog, and conduct the 18 different human health studies related to a spaceflight-like environment.��

Once the team “took off,” they were on their own. Other than a weekday Houston newspaper and a weekly family call, the crew was completely cut off from the outside world.

It was as if the vast unknown had suddenly become very small, and the only way to stay on track was through each other.

“You really have to rely on the crew dynamics,” Wilson said. “I call it team maintenance. Not every day is a winning day. It’s about being open with each other and figuring out how to navigate the challenges.”

Human-machine teaming in space and at home

Each of these simulated missions to Mars is just one small step for mankind. More missions must be completed and more data gathered in order for researchers to develop impactful tools for astronauts during space travel.��

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Wilson tinkering with some machinery in his HERA facility workspace.

For Wilson, these tools rely on a new, multidisciplinary field called human-machine teaming.

Picture your ordinary robot. It may have its own special capabilities that are useful to humans, but Wilson sees more. What if the next generation of human and robot teams operate under shared cognition—they can understand each other and achieve a shared goal?

“Maybe we can pair [astronauts] with a rover that has an idea of how they are doing,” said Wilson. “It can still keep track of their life support systems, but it can also help them make informed decisions based on their levels of stress and fatigue.”

Wilson says robot companions equipped with these types of AI systems can be extremely impactful back on Earth, too. Believe it or not, outer space isn’t the only environment that poses great risk to humans.

“There are people everywhere, in all kinds of environments,” Wilson said. “Maybe these systems can help people in areas where temperatures get really hot or really cold, like Antarctica. Maybe it’s people working long hours or doing things they can’t do all the time.”

The world and its celestial surroundings are diverse, meaning there is plenty of room for researchers like Wilson to leave a mark. His experience inside the HERA facility holds one of the keys to unlocking that potential.��

“Space is a really interesting thing because humans are not designed to be there. We don’t even fully understand cognition on Earth,” said Wilson. “If we can find an effective way to monitor that experience then we can figure out a way to improve it, as well. But we have to get data first.”