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Humans on Mars Initiative

Humans on Mars Initiative

  • Mars

    Humans on Mars

    Pathways to a long-term sustainable exploration

    © Joris Wegner, University of Bremen
  • Portrait of Lucio Colombi Ciacchi.

    Lucio Colombi Ciacchi

    “Learning how to produce metals and other materials on Mars will promote a transition from fire-driven to electricity-driven and CO₂-emission-free materials engineering for the first time ever.”

    © Patrick Pollmeier
  • Kurosch Rezwan working in the laboratory.

    Kurosch Rezwan

    “Thinking the unthinkable is what drives me. Mars is the perfect place for that.”

    © Patrick Pollmeier
  • Researcher Anastasyia Tönjes at work.

    Anastasiya Tönjes

    “Another planet means other materials. For me, as a materials scientist, it is a big challenge. With ‘Humans on Mars‘ I can explore the future today.”

    © Patrick Pollmeier
  • Sven Kerzenmacher working on an experiment.

    Sven Kerzenmacher

    “Martian reality will force us to find radically new approaches in coping with scarcity and foster resource efficiency. This mindset will also help shaping sustainable life on Earth.”

    © Patrick Pollmeier
  • Katharina Brinkert at work.

    Katharina Brinkert

    “The exploration of space and protection of Earth go hand in hand. The complementary approach of the Martian Mindset shows us how much space and Earth science can learn and benefit from each other.”

    © Lukas Klose, University of Bremen

  • Cyprien Verseux

    “The Humans on Mars Initiative is an exciting opportunity to combine my expertise in space biology with that of others in fields far apart – and ultimately, to help make Mars exploration sustainable.”

  • Lutz Mädler

    “The Humans on Mars Mindset requires an engineering vision into a world of unknowns and constraints – not far from what we have on Earth, but more extreme and less complex at the same time.”

    © Jonas Ginter
  • Frank Kirchner next to a robot on Moon like surface

    Frank Kirchner

    “Humans on Mars tackles an extremely important challenge with respect to robotics research. It has the potential to achieve major breakthroughs towards creating robots that are fit for everyday life.”

    © Patrick Pollmeier
  • Daniel Meyer

    Daniel Meyer

    “The unique boundary conditions on Mars require us to re-think manufacturing in a multi-disciplinary approach, which will lead to exciting developments also applicable to the challenges on Earth.”

    © Leibniz-IWT
  • Researcher Christiane Heinecke.

    Christiane Heinicke

    “We set out to find ground-breakingly new answers to sustaining humans on Mars. I love the interdisciplinary challenge and the inevitable implications for our life on Earth.”

    © Patrick Pollmeier
  • Professor Kirsten Tracht at work.

    Kirsten Tracht

    “Planning for Mars habitats will enable a radical new paradigm of producing with sustainability and full circularity as the essential boundary from the beginning of product design and material…

    © Patrick Pollmeier
  • Marc Avila, speaker of the initiative Humans on Mars.

    Marc Avila

    “Mars is inhospitable and has extremely limited natural resources. Under the premise of scarcity, our cross-disciplinary team researches how to sustain humans on Mars and applies the lessons learnt to…

    © Patrick Pollmeier

Humans on Mars

We investigate pathways toward a sustainable human exploration of Mars in seven projects funded by the State of Bremen. The projects focus on human factors, such as the interactions and communication between humans and human-machine mixed teams, on habitats and life support systems, and on the responsible extraction of local resources for the in-situ production of consumables and spare parts.

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Cluster of Excellence "The Martian Mindset"

The Cluster of Excellence “The Martian Mindset” builds on decades of scientific expertise in two of Bremen's research and transfer priority areas: Materials Science and Technologies and Aerospace Engineering. Since 2021, the “Humans on Mars” initiative has merged and enhanced this with the fields of behavioral sciences and communication technology to form an interdisciplinary consortium.

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News and activities

Researchers and management of the University of Bremen stand next to each other in a foyer.
© Matej Meza, University of Bremen

Historic Success: University of Bremen Acquires Funding for Two Clusters of Excellence for the First Time

Scientists from the marine and materials sciences impressed the German federal and state governments in the Excellence Strategy: Two Clusters of Excellence have been awarded to Bremen. This also qualifies the university to apply for the title of “University of Excellence.”

Girl looking through VR goggles
© University of Bremen

Children imagine themself to Mars

Children learn about Mars research in a fun way at a science day at an elementary school in Bremen.

Katharina Brinkert stands in front of her pupils in the lecture hall.
© ZARM, Universität Bremen

20 Years of Children's University - Katharina Brinkert was part of Humans on Mars.

The professor for Human Space Exploration Technologies at the Centre for Applied Space Technology and Microgravity (ZARM) was faced with a clearly younger audience than usual and provided insights into her research and the Humans on Mars initiative.

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Publication highlights

Anaerobic digestion of cyanobacterial biomass for plant fertilizer production on Mars
© 2025, The Authors, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
MAPEX Research Highlights|

Anaerobic digestion of cyanobacterial biomass for plant fertilizer production on Mars

Tiago P. Ramalho, Antje Siol, Sven Kerzenmacher, Cyprien Verseux, Guillaume Pillot

Bioresource Technology 427 (2025): 132383

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2025.132383

A sustained presence on Mars requires the production of food on site, but farming is limited by the local availability of…

Observational_Learning
© 2025, Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Observational Learning of Exploration-Exploitation Strategies in Bandit Tasks

Ludwig Danwitz, Bettina Von Helversen

Cognition 259 (2025): 106124

doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2025.106124

In decision-making scenarios, individuals often face the challenge of balancing between exploring new options and exploiting known ones—a dynamic known as the…

Adverse reactions to the use of large language models in social interactions
© 2025, Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
MAPEX Research Highlights|

Adverse reactions to the use of large language models in social interactions

Fabian Dvorak, Regina Stumpf, Sebastian Fehrler, Urs Fischbacher, Gerelt Tserenjigmid

PNAS Nexus 4 (2025): pgaf112

https://doi.org/10.1093/pnasnexus/pgaf112

Large language models (LLMs) are poised to reshape the way individuals communicate and interact. While this form of AI has the potential to…

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