Pair pushes for manned one-way Mars mission

Space.com : Two researchers are advocating a one-way manned trip to Mars. The reason is twofold: They claim that returning the crew to Earth incurs considerable expense and that such a mission would mark a long-term commitment to colonizing the planet. Environmental scientist Dirk Schulze-Makuch, at Washington State University in Pullman, and physicist Paul Davies, at Arizona State University in Phoenix, state their case in this month’s Journal of Cosmology . “Mars also conceals a wealth of geological and astronomical data that is almost impossible to access from Earth using robotic probes,” the researchers said in their report. “A permanent human presence on Mars would open the way to comparative planetology on a scale unimagined by any former generation.”