And, for those space-cadets who still dream of a manned mission to the planet, there is also the Mars radiation environment experiment.

ECONOMIST: Mars Odyssey

The radiation astronauts would face on a round trip would be comparable to getting an abdominal CT scan "about once every five days, " said Cary Zeitlin, principal scientist for the NASA-led Martian Radiation Environment Experiment.

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Graduate students shuttled equipment across the country by car to avoid shipping them by airplanes, which would put the experiment closer to cosmic radiation.

WSJ: Physicists Look for Dark Matter Underground