Scott Kelly is an American astronaut who will soon become the first American to spend an entire year living in space. On March 27, 2015, Kelly will lift off to the International Space Station, from a space center located in Kazakhstan. Accompanying him will be Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko.
Although NASA has never flown a single astronaut for an entire year, cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov spent 437 days aboard the Mir space station, ending his mission in March 1995.
"What makes this exciting for me, this one-year flight is about the science and everything we're going to learn from expanding the envelope on the space station greater than what we've currently done," Kelly told reporters during a news conference held in Paris.
Currently, NASA plans to send humans to Mars sometime during the 2030's. In order to do this, the space agency still needs to learn about the effects of long-term space travel on the human body. A flight to the Red Planet will last three years from launch to the time space travelers return to the Earth.
When liftoff takes place, Kelly will be just a few weeks past his 51st birthday.
The pair of space travelers have been training for six months for their historic flight. Each has spent half a year aboard the space station, although at separate times.
Kelly's first spaceflight, taken aboard the space shuttle in 1999, lasted just nine days. His second fight lasted 13 days. In 2010, he was sent on a 159-day mission to the International Space Station.
Between the years 1987 and 1995, Moscow flew a total of four cosmonauts for flights of one year or longer.
"We have progressed considerably in our understanding of the human physiology in space and in countermeasures to preserve bone, muscle and fitness since then," Michael Barratt, program manager for the Human Research Program at Johnson Space Center, said.
Kornienko is a 54-year-old former Soviet paratrooper who recently became a grandfather for the first time.
Kelly has a twin brother, Mark, who is also a NASA astronaut. The two have volunteered for medical studies to identify possible health issues for space travelers. People who spend long periods of time in space can suffer from the loss of bone and muscle mass, as well as heart problems and decreased sensory motor functions.
"If we're ever going to go to Mars someday, the International Space Station is really a great platform to learn much more about having people live and work in space for longer durations. It's close to the Earth, and it's a great orbiting facility," Kelly told reporters.
