The
Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog (CHAPEA) research team at
NASA Johnson Space Center is conducting a series of missions to simulate a year-long stay on Mars. Data collected during these missions will allow NASA researchers to study potential food system design, resource management, and other potential effects on physical and behavioral health and performance. Each mission will consist of four crew members living in the CHAPEA habitat, an isolated 1,700 square foot habitat.
In collaboration with this project, NASA Ames' Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) Group provides the mission software Playbook tool that enables planning, scheduling, and execution of crew timelines. Additionally, Playbook provides the essential capability of a multimedia chat interface that simulates the long communication latencies expected on Mars (up to 22 minutes delay). This is also the first time Playbook has supported timelines of this length, supporting search of hundreds of messages and activities – a new technical achievement for the software.
