NASA Invites You To Send Your Name To Mars On Its Next Mission

NASA is giving the public the opportunity to send their names to Mars on its latest mission to the ‘Red Planet’.

The Insight Lander is scheduled to blast off to Mars in 2016, and will carry with it a silicon microchip containing all the submitted names.

Space fans who want to send their name to the ‘Red Planet’ can sign up online, where they’ll be issued with a personalised ‘boarding pass’.

Those who sign up can build up ‘frequent flier’ points across NASA’s Mars missions.

This is the second time that NASA has offered people the chance to be involved with its Mars mission.

Last December, the names of 1.38 million people flew on a chip aboard the first flight of the Orion spacecraft, which will eventually carry astronauts to Mars and beyond.

The American space agency has yet to announce what the frequent flier points will eventually be worth, if anything, though it’s highly unlikely that they will translate into a free trip to Mars.

The latest launch is set to take place in March 2016.

The Insight Lander will be the first to investigate the deep interior of Mars and will take seismic readings of Martian quakes. A self-hammering probe will be deployed to examine the the geology below the planet’s surface.

“Our next step in the journey to Mars is another fantastic mission to the surface,” said Jim Green, director of planetary science at NASA. “By participating in this opportunity to send your name aboard InSight to the Red Planet, you’re showing that you’re part of that journey and the future of space exploration.”

(Image credit: NASA)