She told BBC News that the mission planners wanted the crew to consist of an older couple whose relationship would be able to withstand the stress of living in a confined environment for two years.

The couple would receive extensive training and would be able to draw on psychological support from mission control throughout the mission.

The mission will be a straightforward flight to the Red Planet and return without landing. This greatly reduces the cost of the mission. The Mars Inspiration team believe that it is technically possible to launch such a mission in five years' time.

An asteroid as large as an Olympic swimming pool has raced past the Earth at a distance of just 27,700km (17,200mi) - the closest ever predicted for an object of that size.

The asteroid's arrival was preceded by a damaging meteor event in Russia on Friday - but indications from the meteor's path suggest that the two events are entirely unrelated - just a "cosmic coincidence", as Alan Fitzsimmons of Queens University Belfast told BBC News.

Following Curiosity's landing on Mars in August, the rover's RAD device has measured radiation that's comparable to what astronauts experience aboard the International Space Station.

Mars lacks a global magnetic field, and researchers believe this led to the loss of most of its atmosphere long ago under solar wind bombardment. RAD has found that as the remaining Martian atmosphere thickens and thins daily, radiation levels rise and fall by 3 to 5 percent.

He set foot on the Moon on 20 July 1969, famously describing the event as "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind".

Armstrong and fellow astronaut Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin spent nearly three hours walking on the moon, collecting samples, conducting experiments and taking photographs.

One of two wind sensors on REMS sent back nonsensical data. Inspections with Curiosity's cameras revealed that some of its wires are broken, and there's little hope of finding a workaround.

"It could have been worse. The damaged sensor was a backup, designed to get extra measurements when the wind was coming from directly behind the rover. The other, forward-facing sensor is "working perfectly", says REMS principal investigator Javier Gomez-Elvira.

The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft successfully berthed with the International Space Station this morning after a long overnight approach including several unplanned maneuvers.

For both SpaceX and NASA the capture moment marks the beginning of a shift in how cargo will be delivered to and from the space station, with the eventual goal of changing how manned flight itself is done to low Earth orbit.

A "supermoon" has graced the skies, appearing bigger and brighter than usual, as it comes closer to the Earth - and is likely to bring higher tides.

When the Moon appears at its biggest it will be just 356,400km (221,457 miles) away, compared to its usual distance from Earth of 384,000km (238,606 miles).

Ten years ago on March 1, the European Space Agency launched an 8-ton satellite called Envisat that would deliver back to Earth some of the most beautiful images of our planet taken from space.

To celebrate the satellite's 10th anniversary, we've selected a few of its most beautiful images for this gallery. Good luck deciding which one to use as wallpaper for your computer desktop.

NASA's plans in the post-shuttle era are somewhat unclear, although it aims to keep flying astronauts to the space station until at least 2020, initially on Russian Soyuz rockets and later on private space taxis. In the more distant future, it may also send people to an asteroid and then on to Mars, although these goals may shift depending on how much funding the agency receives from Congress.

Two scientists are suggesting that colonization of the red planet could happen faster and more economically if astronauts behaved like the first settlers to come to North America - not expecting to go home.

Schulze-Makuch and Paul Davies, a physicist at Arizona State University, argue that humans must begin colonizing another planet as a hedge against a catastrophe on Earth. They believe the one-way trips could start in two decades.

Both men contend that Mars has abundant resources to help the colonists become self-sufficient over time. They write that the colony should be next to a large ice cave, to provide shelter from radiation, plus water and oxygen.