To say the least, a trip to Mars will be arduous. Although human spaceflight has become more common in recent decades, leaving our gravitational pull requires a lot of rocket power
It will also need a lot of energy to leave a planet like Mars and return to Earth.
NASA, other space agencies, and private corporations have set their sights on landing humans on Mars and successfully returning them to Earth
As a result, engineers and scientists are striving to find out how to produce enough propellant to make such a journey viable.
On Mars, oxygen, a critical component of rocket propulsion, is in short supply. However, data from a prototype machine on Mars indicate that the element can be plucked out of the air
"It's exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to design a human Mars mission that doesn't employ in situ resources," says Carol Stoker, a planetary scientist at NASA Ames Research Center.
A lunch-box-sized gadget attached to the Perseverance rover has now enabled the production of fuel from materials found on Mars