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Mars500 Mission Begins
krou writes "The six participants in the Mars500 project have entered their sealed facility. The project, which lasts for 18 months, is designed to try and simulate a mission to Mars, completely isolated and cut off from the outside world, with a '20-minute, one-way time-delay in communications to mirror the real lag in sending messages over the vast distance between Mars and Earth.' They also have limited consumables, with everything required being loaded onboard from the start. You can follow developments via the blog, or the Twitter feed of Diego Urbina, one of the would-be cosmonauts."
But it's about as meaningful an "experiment" as that silly "Biosphere 2 [wikipedia.org]" trainwreck in the early 90's.
How dare you impugn the scientific credentials of a bunch of improv theater players! They got their credentials from a legitimate art gallery/café in London!