NASA approves restart of grant to University of Hawaii space exploration simulation program

The University of Hawaii at Manoa said Tuesday that NASA has approved the restart of a $1 million grant to complete research from its Hawaiʻi Space Exploration Analog and Simulation (HI-SEAS) project following the completion of an institutional review.

Since 2012, the NASA-funded research program has operated five, long-duration planetary surface missions on the flank of Mauna Loa, an isolated environment similar to Mars, to investigate crew composition and cohesion.

The HI-SEAS Mission VI was abruptly canceled on Feb. 26, after one of the four crew members voluntarily withdrew from the program. A few days earlier, an accident that sent a crew member to Hilo Medical Center triggered an institutional review by UH and NASA. That review has been completed, said UH, and the project has been approved to go forward.

At the time, UH had said it would put out a new call for applicants to assemble a new crew for what was to be an eight-month mission to Mauna Loa to perform exploration tasks such as geological fieldwork. UH at the time declined to name the crew member who voluntarily withdrew.

This grant covers the research and data, according to the university, but not a new mission, which may become a possibility at a later time.

Due to a tight timeline, UH said that NASA Human Research Roadmap asked that the HI-SEAS team rescope the final phase of the project and develop comprehensive data from its missions over a six-year span.

NASA is also providing additional funds for a “more robust version” of data analysis than previously planned. Under the new grant, HI-SEAS will perform data mining of all its previous missions, including I through V, related to team composition, including its studies of individual personalities, cognitive function and behavioral health changes. UH will also develop a comprehensive database of all HI-SEAS data collected under NASA’s funding as well as from HI-SEAS collaborators.

“We’re excited to be able to put the 36 months’ worth of mission data we’ve collected over the past five years to good use: advancing human space exploration,” said principal investigator and UH-Manoa Professor Kim Binsted in a news release.

The data collection and analysis is expected to be completed by the end of 2019.