Thank you for your interest in contributing to the growing body of space analog research. This document informs potential authors about the JSAR project, the field of space analog research, and our submission process.
What is JSAR?
The Journal of Space Analog Research (JSAR) exists to meet the needs of the community of researchers finding ways to conduct space research using more-accessible and lower-cost simulations of the space environment here on Earth. This is a project of The Mars Society. We are drawing from our extensive experience running simulated Mars missions at our habitats in the Utah desert (Mars Desert Research Station or MDRS) and the Arctic Circle (Flashline Station) and our ever-growing network of researchers and participants. While we highly encourage applying to conduct primary research at our locations, we are enthusiastically open to papers drawing from previous missions, activities performed at other analog stations around the globe, or other sources altogether as long as they fit our vision of furthering the field of space analog research. Space analog research is discussed at greater length in the following section.
Our first official step in this project is our exciting partnership with the Journal of Human Performance in Extreme Environments (JHPEE) at Purdue University. We announced on May 14, 2025 the upcoming publication of special sections within JHPEE focused on space analog research. JSAR will thus unofficially launch as a smaller journal within JHPEE and evolve from there to according to the needs of the space analog research community. We look forward to working together with Dr. Barrett Caldwell and his editorial team to publish high quality peer-reviewed articles.
Not all prospective space analog research papers will be a good fit for JHPEE, so we invite you to review their aims and scope to ensure alignment. If you have a paper that you feel qualifies as space analog research, but does not pertain to human performance in extreme environments, please contact us at jsar@marssociety.org and we will do our best to assist you in finding a suitable publication. Eventually we hope to accommodate all relevant space analog research papers through additional partnerships and/or internally developed peer-review and publication processes.
Space Analog Research
Space analog research has existed as long as humanity has been engineering and testing for space activities (circa 1960s). A core aspect of space analog research is finding or creating conditions on Earth that are similar to the space environment. Here, we simulate and test in preparation for actual space activities. Examples of simulations include:
- Vacuum chambers for the lack of atmosphere
- Parabolic flights for freefall/microgravity
- Neutral buoyancy tanks for weightlessness
- Unique remote locations for topography and/or isolation
Space analog research includes both narrow and broad categories of research. One example of narrow, specific research is the testing of a certain hardware component in a machine that simulates one aspect of the space environment like vacuum or radiation. An example of broad, multifaceted research is carrying out an entire simulated space mission to study infrastructure, technology, resource management, agriculture, waste management, food production, crew mental and physical health, psychology, or any number of additional facets.
The time has come to more deliberately organize and guide conversations and research efforts regarding the ambitious goals the scientific community, government space agencies, and private industry have laid out for space activities. Space analog research is necessary for a future that has commercial space stations, space-based resource extraction, space manufacturing, space tourism, and a permanent human presence on orbit, on the Moon, and on Mars. JSAR aims to foster that important dialogue.
The Mars Society (TMS) has been a leader in space analog activities for the past 20+ years. We have extensive experience enabling high-fidelity simulated space missions. Our sites at the Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) in the high desert of Southern Utah and the Flashline Mars Arctic Research Station (Flashline) on Devon Island in the Nunavut Territory (Canada), contribute to this experience. We encourage researchers to utilize our extensive crew reports from past missions to both inspire future missions or research projects, and conduct meta-analyses of the analog missions performed there. We invite other analog sites with similar resources to contact us at jsar@marssociety.org so we can link to your records here as well.
MDRS has seen research from the fields of geology, botany, hydrology, chemistry, psychology, robotics, nutrition, and many others. Given that these are established fields in their own right, we encourage researchers to continue to publish their findings as they pertain to the various methodologies they represent. For a paper to qualify as space analog research, it must have a major focus on how the research impacts or informs space activities. For example, good geological research conducted as part of a simulated Mars mission at MDRS may belong in a geology journal but not necessarily in JSAR unless there is a focus on how the results compare to what we expect to find on Mars (or what we’ve seen in data from orbiters, landers, and rovers). We also encourage research where the focus is on the process rather than results. To continue the geology example, a potential paper may not necessarily provide interesting scientific results pertaining to the field of geology, but if it contains research into how geology will be conducted by humans on Mars (perhaps including comparisons to how this compares to current robotic missions), it could be a great fit for JSAR.
We envision our primary focus to be on analog research that directly informs and impacts the science, technology, and operations of human spaceflight. We also welcome submissions on other types of space analog research. This could include research focused only on hardware with no human elements involved, and it could also include pieces from the arts and humanities. Explorations about why we go to space, how it will change what it means to be human, or the social and economic impacts it may have on us are also important.
Submission Process
Submissions are received on an ongoing basis. Please go to the JHPEE submission page to create a login and upload your submission when ready. If your paper does not fit the aims and scope of JHPEE, please contact us at jsar@marssociety.org for further assistance.
Deadlines for consideration to present research papers at the annual Mars Society Convention or other events will be communicated through general announcements.
Given the multi- and interdisciplinary nature of JSAR, we invite authors to include lists of researchers they feel are qualified to review their work. The peer review process will be anonymous and may or may not include the individuals recommended. Each paper will be subjected to review by at least two readers and will require as many iterations of edits and resubmissions as the readers and editorial team require.