{"id":571474,"date":"2026-05-07T17:59:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T17:59:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/571474\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T17:59:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T17:59:12","slug":"a-researcher-may-have-found-a-shortcut-to-mars-as-nasa-eyes-red-planet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/571474\/","title":{"rendered":"A researcher may have found a shortcut to Mars as NASA eyes red planet"},"content":{"rendered":"

Under the best circumstances, a trip from Earth to Mars<\/a> and back would take a spacecraft three years to complete.<\/p>\n

And that’s during a very specific orbital alignment that occurs once every two years or so as the two planets travel around the sun.<\/p>\n

But new research has unveiled a possible shortcut to Mars that would drastically reduce the time it would take to reach the red planet<\/a>. Taking a cue from the orbital trajectories of asteroids, a researcher discovered what he claims is a viable shortcut to and from Mars<\/a> that would span less than a year.<\/p>\n

The finding comes as NASA is in the midst of returning astronauts to the moon<\/a> under the space<\/a> agency’s Artemis program, which has the larger objective in the years ahead of sending the first humans to Mars.<\/p>\n

NASA releases thousands more Artemis II photos. Here are the best.<\/p>\n

1 of 15<\/p>\n

NASA released thousands of new photos taken during the Artemis II mission around the moon. The astronauts selected for the mission thoroughly documented the 10-day voyage, which included an April 6 lunar flyby as they traveled more than a quarter-million miles from Earth.<\/p>\n

Here’s what to know about the newly-found possible shorter trajectory to Mars, and what it could mean ahead of future missions to Earth’s planetary neighbor.<\/p>\n

How long does it take to reach Mars?\"Mosaic<\/p>\n

Mosaic of the Valles Marineris hemisphere of Mars projected into point perspective, a view similar to that which one would see from a spacecraft.<\/p>\n

On average, Mars is 140 million miles from Earth.<\/p>\n

But because the distance between Earth and Mars is constantly changing based on their orbits, the best time for spacecraft \u2013 with or without a crew \u2013 to venture to the red planet comes once every 26 months<\/a>. During that window when the two planets are closest together on the same side of the sun, traveling to Mars takes anywhere from seven to 10 months<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For future missions with astronauts who would, of course, want to return to Earth, they’d have to wait for another return window, stretching a crewed mission to nearly three years<\/a>, according to NASA.<\/p>\n

Astronomer finds shortcut from Earth to Mars<\/p>\n

But what if we could cut the time it takes for that round trip in half?<\/p>\n

Using the early orbital data of asteroids, Marcelo de Oliveira Souza<\/a>, a cosmologist\u00a0at the State University of Northern Rio de Janeiro, said he was able to find a way to shave off a significant amount of time for the interplanetary journey.<\/p>\n

Souza followed the early predicted path of a near-Earth asteroid that crossed the orbit of both Earth and Mars to make his findings, which were published in the journal Acta Astronautica<\/a>.<\/p>\n

By following the initial predicted route of near-Earth asteroid 2001 CA21<\/a> around the sun, Souza concluded that a human-made spacecraft could follow a similar trajectory on a much more direct path to Mars.<\/p>\n

Souza also analyzed potential launch windows based on Mars and Earth’s orbits to determine that 2031 may offer the best opportunity for a shorter trip. In that year, the study identified two possible profiles for a round trip to the red planet, with total durations of about 153 and 226 days.<\/p>\n

It’s important to note, though, that either option would require a spacecraft to travel at speeds well beyond current capabilities of both rockets and landings systems, Souza wrote.<\/p>\n

In honor of Earth Day, see these photos of our planet from space<\/p>\n

1 of 12<\/p>\n

The crew of Artemis II captured a breathtaking image of a celestial event known as an “Earthset,” in which the Earth dropped below the lunar horizon. The image is reminiscent of the iconic “Earthrise” photo that NASA astronaut Bill Anders captured in 1968 during the Apollo 8 mission that showed our planet rising on the lunar horizon.<\/p>\n

Discovery comes as NASA eyes 1st human Mars missions\"An<\/p>\n

An artist’s concept of the Space Reactor-1 mission to send the 1st nuclear-powered spacecraft to Mars<\/p>\n

While Souza’s concept is largely theoretical, the researcher posited that it could still prove useful for space agencies charting voyages to Mars based on the planet’s movements in relation to Earth.<\/p>\n

NASA in particular has its sights set on sending the first humans to Mars in the next few years. A key objective of the agency’s Artemis lunar campaign<\/a> is to use a series of human moon landings to inform how crewed travel deeper into space<\/a> \u2013 including to Mars \u2013 could be accomplished.<\/p>\n

First, though, NASA plans in 2028 to\u00a0launch the first nuclear-powered spacecraft to Mars<\/a>\u00a0in what could be a pivotal test of a technology that could also be a power source for human surface operations. The Space Reactor-1 vehicle would reach Mars in 2030 and deploy three helicopters similar to\u00a0the retired Ingenuity aircraft<\/a>\u00a0that would survey for potential human landing sites and use radar to identify sources of underground water.<\/p>\n

Such fission nuclear-powered technology used in the spacecraft could be vital on Mars where dust storms known to block the sun for weeks at a time would make solar power unreliable.<\/p>\n

Eric Lagatta is the Space Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at elagatta@usatodayco.com<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Astronauts could soon head to Mars. How long does it take to get there?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Under the best circumstances, a trip from Earth to Mars and back would take a spacecraft three years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":571475,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[195529,195530,92,90,416,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-571474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-distance-between-earth-and-mars","tag-human-mars-missions","tag-nasa","tag-science","tag-space","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/571475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}