Last Exit: Space (2022) - full transcript

From time immemorial,

we humans have looked up
at the night sky,

marveling at billions
of tiny specks.

Settling on distant planets
was once the domain

of poets and dreamers.

But with every leap
in technology,

we come closer
to realizing their dreams.

Today, techies
and entrepreneurs

plan to colonize
faraway planets.

The first step on this journey
to conquer the galaxy,

will be our own solar system.



Incredibly, scientists
are even working on voyages

to planets around other stars.

They see us as
an interstellar species,

that will spread
across the cosmos.

So have we humans
outgrown our little planet?

Or do we need to seek
our destiny among the stars?

We're off on
a sweeping quest

to discover
the cutting-edge projects

driving today's
space revolution.

On our voyage, we will learn
that the most ambitious ideas

are sometimes found
in the remotest places.

Our travels begin in
Coeur d'Alene, Idaho,

where America's disaster
preppers go off-grid.

We want to meet the world's
most fervent prophet
of space colonization.



Leading futurologist
Marshall Savage

penned Colonizing The Galaxy
in Eight Easy Steps.

He's mapped out
humanity's exit from Earth.

This is an instinctive urge
of our species

to migrate into space.

The way salmon
return upstream.

You know, this is something
we're going to do,

and you can see people
like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk
are actually doing it,

and they're an expression of
that urge of the human race

to spread itself, ultimately,
among the stars.

And if we survive,
that will happen.

and if it doesn't happen,
we probably won't survive.

I've lived out west
all my life, and we've always
had forest fires.

But never anything like this.

Whole towns are being
burned to the ground.

And it makes you wonder
what is next year

and the year after
going to be like.

Marshall Savage
has observed that our climate
is at a tipping point.

There is a catastrophe
in the making.

We've already
advanced too far,

in terms of changing
the underlying climate
to prevent it.

Marshall fears
that our planet may soon
become uninhabitable.

I can't tell you when
it's going to happen.

But we should go as soon
as we're capable of going.

In Copenhagen,
Anna Olsen has heard the call
to go to space.

It might be an unlikely place.

But a harbor warehouse
is where the biology student

wants to take on
an immense challenge.

She's determined
to be the first astronaut

of a group of
weekend rocketeers...

The Copenhagen Suborbitals.

As motley as this crew
of students, electricians
and engineers may seem,

their technology
is highly sophisticated.

Anna and her team want
to go down in history

as the first amateur group to
complete a human spaceflight.

Before going
into space,

I think I will need to prepare
by exercising,

because you are exposed
to a lot of G-forces.

So you have to be
some kind of physically fit.

I think it will be a quite an
unpleasant journey up there,

but once you reach
zero gravity,

I think it'll be amazing.

Meanwhile,
Anna's father, Carsten Olsen,
is another astronaut hopeful.

I actually
love space flights.

I love the idea of going
to another planet.

It's a great adventure.

It's like dreaming
about new worlds,

and I have a huge dream
in my life.

Looking at the moon
from space,

that would be...

Really, really beautiful,
I think.

Financed entirely
by donations,

the Suborbitals are already
launching self-built rockets,

from this platform
in the Baltic Sea.

The Danish Coast Guard closes
the area for boat traffic,

when the scaled-down rockets
hurtle thousands of feet
into the sky.

Encouraged by their successes,

the Suborbitals are now
building a full-sized rocket.

Anna is personally
seeing to the details.

I am painting the tanks
for the Spica rocket,

which is the rocket that will
hopefully go into space.

And it is one meter
in diameter

which is also the space
that I will be sitting in.

So I will be sitting in
a cannonball position,

with my knees up to my ears.

So, that's not a lot of space.

Unfortunately,
cramped conditions

aren't the only danger
DIY astronauts might face.

And we have splashdown.

Some of
the unmanned tests
didn't turn out well,

with engines failing
and tanks running out of fuel.

And that's why
before Anna and Carsten
lift off to the stars,

this gentleman will
have to complete some
successful flights.

This is Rescue Randy,
our crash test dummy.

He is our first
flight astronaut.

He has been flying
several times in our capsules.

And not each flight
has been very good.

Once he flew in
one of the capsules

where the parachute
didn't fall out as it was
supposed to.

And he lost his leg
during that.

Our doctor of medicine,
he told us

that he would have
survived, but...

He wouldn't be in
a very good condition.

But you can still be a good
astronaut without a leg.

Undaunted
by such incidents,

we found Anna lost
in her own universe.

I dream of
going to space.

And just floating around
in zero gravity.

I would love to experience
the silence on another planet.

For instance, on Mars.

And just see how red it is.

And experiencing
the totally uncolonized
planet.

Anna and Carsten
are ready for takeoff.

And they are not
the only enthusiasts

looking forward
to the conquest of space.

There is a race going on,

faster and more ambitious
than ever before.

Billionaire entrepreneurs
are venturing out into space

in a testosterone-fueled
competition.

With the survival
of humankind at stake,

they're pushing
for the colonization
of our galaxy.

What is your vision
for the future
of space exploration?

What we wanna see is
millions of people living
and working in space.

Space is a...

Is an adventure.

It has limitless
resources that...

You know, we're finding
that the Earth is a very
finite place.

And we humans need
to go into space

if we're to continue
to evolve our civilization.

We have
to drive innovation hard
to make life multi-planetary.

I think this is very important
to secure the future of life
as we know it,

to ensure that the light of
consciousness does not go out.

Landers and
starships are being built.

Not only to take astronauts
to other planets,

but to transport hundreds
of thousands of settlers

to inhabit vast
space cities imagined
by Elon Musk and others.

But what does colonizing
the dark desolation of space
really mean?

In Creede, Colorado,
we seek out a man who can
shed light on the matter.

Mike Foale spent more
than a year away
from our home planet.

For him, it was an
eye-opening experience.

When you think
about what's out there,

and what we're a part of
in terms of being the speck.

The speck

in this universe.

It's... It's pretty cosmic.

It's a mind-altering
experience.

It's very exciting.

Mike Foale
was once a commander
of our lone outpost in space.

The International
Space Station is one of

mankind's greatest
achievements.

It's something equivalent,
I think, to the pyramids.

It's one of those great
wonders of the world.

And that contribution,
I think, to you know,
to human posterity

is the beginning of
settlements in space.

But venturing out
like this comes at a price...

Mike Foale is a survivor
of a collision on the Russian
space station, Mir,

one of the worst accidents
in space history.

He knows from
personal experience

what navigating outer space
really means.

Space is
a hard environment.

A vacuum at a temperature
on average ranging from

minus 200 Celsius all the way
up to plus 200 Celsius.

That's a huge variation
of temperature.

And, of course,
there's no air.

And if you go near
a window that doesn't have
ultraviolet protection,

you get burned,
sunburned in 30 seconds.

And you'll also, occasionally,
look out at your spacecraft,

and you'll see holes in...

In the solar arrays, and
you go, "Oh, wow!

That was a rock
that went through."

If things go wrong
in your spacecraft,

of course you're on
a knife's edge there.

All of your life support
systems have to work.

Your oxygen
has to be produced.

Your carbon dioxide
has to be scrubbed.

Your water has
to be supplied and your food
needs to be present.

So, that's the hard
part of space.

Despite all this,
Mike Foale remains unfazed.

And there are
a number of humans like me,

men and women, who are
driven by the same motivations
that I have.

So, they will suffer well
the difficulties,
the challenges, the deaths,

the disease,
all of the problems

of exploring and going
beyond the Earth
to settle in space.

But it won't be
99.99% of humanity,
it'll be a tiny fraction.

With that just 100 or 1,000
out in space,

then humans will survive
the asteroid impact
that's bound to happen.

Or the ecological disasters
that are bound to, you know,
bound to happen.

Humanity as it...

Not as it is today,
but as it will evolve,

will continue
beyond the Earth.

There will always
be people like Mike Foale

who want to venture
out into the unknown,

no matter how hazardous
it might be.

It's the human
pioneering spirit

that will drive us
into the solar system.

To find out what
a space colony might look like
we've come to the Ramon Crater

some 120 miles
south of Jerusalem
in the Negev Desert.

There are few places on Earth
that are as geologically
similar to Mars.

And that's the reason why

a precious cargo
is being transported
to this remote region.

Whoa, look at that.
Welcome to the desert.

Welcome to Mars.

That is the helmet

of the experimental
spacesuit simulator, Aouda.X.

We've been working
for more than ten years

on this spacecraft
that we're in.

It's able to mimic
all the major limitations

in actual space it would have,

so seeing this here
means we're almost good to go.

Astrophysicist
Gernot Gromer,

is the director of
the Austrian Space Forum.

His organization is simulating
a possible colony on Mars.

NASA and the European Space
Agency are also involved,

making it the most
elaborate project
of its kind in the world.

Today they are testing
a state-of-the-art spacesuit

with sensors
and bio-feedback systems.

Ultimately,
after 30,000 generations
of Homo sapiensas a species,

we are one of the first ones
who have the technological
means to do that journey.

We are, I think,
a migratory species.

And I believe there will be
cities on Mars,

for sure,
it's just a matter of time.

It will be a statement
to the universe,
we are out there.

This might be
the first glimpse

of our future
as space colonists.

But what challenges
will we have to overcome
to realize this dream?

There is a man who is
more acquainted than most
with the challenges of Mars.

Doug Hofmann works for
NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab,

which has sent several rovers
to the red planet.

He knows all about conditions
on this alien world.

So, we have several
landers and rovers

on the surface of Mars,

and honestly,
for human habitation,

Mars is pretty inhospitable.

So, it's cold for starters.

We also have, you know,
virtually no atmosphere,

which contributes to it
being cold.

And of course we don't see
any living things

on the surface of Mars
due to those harsh conditions.

Even getting there
would be fraught with danger.

Astronauts would travel
outside the protection

of the Earth's magnetic field
and atmosphere that shield us
from radiation.

Solar eruptions randomly fling
charged particles into space.

Such a solar storm
could wipe out a crew
headed for Mars.

If you're traveling
between Earth and Mars,
out in deep space,

and there's a significant
solar event,

that can create sort of an
enormous amount of radiation

which would be very hard
to shield against and would be

potentially life-threatening
to a crew.

On top of that,
astronauts would
have to endure

a bombardment
of galactic cosmic radiation.

These are
very high-energy particles,

and so you really need,
you know, maybe 10 meters
or more

of liquid water
or liquid hydrogen
to protect you.

So, essentially the way
I like to think about this is,

you're essentially
putting your spacecraft
into a fish tank.

You've got a big fish tank
and you're the goldfish
sitting in the middle.

Once astronauts have
arrived on the surface of Mars
their troubles won't end.

Radiation is more than
12 times that of Earth,

not counting
deadly solar storms.

The reality of a life on Mars
would be sobering.

A crew of hardy astronauts
would hunker down
in radiation-proof bunkers,

enjoying drinks
of recycled urine.

While cities on Mars
seem fantastical,

this kind of rugged outpost
could be within our reach.

There is someone
who thinks it's possible.

But if they ask you
to be a Mars settler,
you had better flee.

Space anthropologist,
Taylor Genovese

asked to meet us
in an abandoned missile site,

the most depressing place
he could find.

The reality of going
to another planet

in our current environment,
I think is probably most...

The best analogy is
an Amazon fulfillment center.

You won't be able
to actually see where you are.

You're gonna be
inside of a factory.

And you're not
going to experience

what you think you're
going to be experiencing.

That is, the kind of awe
of being on another planet,

and experiencing
being off of Earth.

No, you're gonna be working
inside of a cubicle.

Despite this
grim outlook,

corporate businessmen have
intensified their mission,

forging ahead
with private space programs.

The privatization
of space flight has become
the norm now.

You know, Blue Origin
is an offshoot of Amazon.

And we have Virgin Galactic
as an offshoot of the Virgin
conglomerate.

So, instead of pushing
into space to explore,

now we're seeing
space corporations
wanting to go into space

solely to exploit
the resources that are there,

wanting to push
people into space,

so that they have a workforce
to control and maintain

their corporate
executives' vision
of what space needs to be.

Taylor is concerned
about the implications

of commercial settlements
on Mars.

Let's say we have
a community on Mars.

Musk Town, we'll call it,
is on Mars.

And Elon's back on Earth
because he knows that
it's better to be on a planet

you can breathe on,
and kind of direct

the people
that are in Musk Town.

Let's say they're mining
rare Earth minerals.

Something that would be
quite valuable.

And they're starting
to get fed up with

the 12-hour work shifts
or whatever.

The problem that we face
with a private corporation
in that instance

is that they're
in sole control
of that settlement.

What's stopping Papa Elon
from turning off the oxygen?

Or from restricting
food shipments

or restricting
water shipments?

The reason
I'm so cynical about this,

and why I'm talking about
that specifically,

is we're seeing similar
tactics used today in,

for example,
Amazon fulfillment centers.

These same tactics
are being used

in order to quash
justifiable worker grievances.

The difference,
of course, is that

they're here on Earth,
and they can go home.

On Mars, you can't do that.

And with a little bit of...

you know, turning the screws
by Elon Musk,

he can essentially turn
his free-market paradise
into a feudal slavery system.

In space terms,
Mars may be close.

But it's fraught
with challenges.

Perhaps it would be
more promising

to look for
a more hospitable place
beyond our solar system.

There might be stars
out there orbited
by planets like our own.

We travel to Mauna Kea,
a volcano in Hawaii,

site of cutting-edge
telescopes.

Its dizzying altitude
and pitch-dark nights

have made it the mecca
of stargazers.

We meet a former
advisory board member

of Mauna Kea's
Gemini telescope,

renowned astronomer,
Lucianne Walkowicz.

Lucianne is one of the world's
foremost planet hunters.

We look for things that are
maybe the size of Earth.

So, places that could have
these nice, rocky surfaces

that, you know,
have oceans on them.

We look for places that
are the right temperature,

not too hot, not too cold.

We often compare it to
the fairy tale of Goldilocks

and her porridge, right?
Not too hot, not too cold.

And that's 'cause we want
the water to exist
in liquid form.

And that's because
liquid water

is one of the best solutions
for the chemistry of life.

And then we look for
the atmosphere,

and whether the atmosphere
would be likely to have

things like oxygen,
or a balance of different
kinds of atmospheric gases

that would be conducive
to life surviving.

Until the late 2000s,

only a few planets
outside our solar system
had been discovered.

And nobody knew
whether any were like Earth.

But then, everything changed.

One of the most
transformative things

for the discovery of planets
around other stars

was really the Kepler mission,
which launched in 2009.

And I had the great fortune
to be part of the Kepler
science team.

I joined just before launch,
so I got to be present

and experience this
nerve-wracking experience
of seeing your future career

be put on top of
an exploding rocket

that is going to
hurtle it into space.

Lift-off for
the Delta II rocket
with Kepler,

on a search for planets
in some way like our own.

The launch
of the Kepler space telescope

might just be remembered
as the beginning
of the biggest discovery

in astronomy in our lifetime,

peering further into space
than any optical telescope
on Earth.

Kepler began its search
for faraway worlds.

And it was really Kepler
that opened its eye,

and then suddenly
started to find

world after world,
these thousands of planets
that we never knew existed,

and that imply the existence
of billions of planets more.

So it really,
really changed
the game

and really opened up
the universe to us.

Kepler discovered
that many of these
countless exoplanets

looked strangely familiar.

Nobody could
tell you whether there
were other planets

that were even potentially
like Earth out there.

And now, it seems that that
is probably the most common
kind of planet that there is.

And we still don't know
whether those planets
are really like Earth,

in the sense that we mean it,
where we can walk around

and enjoy the sunshine
and the breeze

and the wind in our face.

But it does mean that

there are a lot of places
to look for life.

Most exciting of all,
exoplanets have been detected
in our neighboring system,

Alpha Centauri.

One of them,
Proxima Centauri b,
is 4.2 light-years away.

In the vastness
of the universe,
that's almost next-door.

But even if this exoplanet
turned out to be habitable,

a flight there
would take 5,000 years.

I think
one of the challenges

with the ideas that are
out there for traveling
through space,

these huge distances that,
you know,

we don't have
great solutions for

human beings travelling
within their own lifetime

to even the closest
neighboring planetary systems.

So, there are these ideas
that you could put people

on what we call
generation ships,

where many generations
of people

would live on those ships,
and then perhaps not you,
but your descendants,

or your descendants'
descendants,

would one day arrive
at this planetary system.

For this mission
to succeed,

successive generations
would have to live
and die in transit.

Unless science can find
a better solution.

In the movies,
interstellar astronauts
are deep-frozen

and resuscitated when
they reach their destination.

There are major institutions
around the world

who are taking this cue
from science fiction.

At the European Space Agency's
medical lab in Cologne,

space surgeon,
Adrianos Golemis

is at the forefront
of how to ready astronauts
for interstellar voyages.

Wouldn't it be great
when humanity ventures
further into the cosmos,

to use the concept
of hibernation?

This is something we observe
in the animal kingdom.

And there's definitely a lot
we can learn from nature.

So, what we know is that
when animals hibernate,
they use less energy,

and for a long period of time,

with less energy,
they can survive.

That's very practical
for space flight.

Because imagine
if you want to go on
a very long-duration mission.

Then if you are in
a hibernated state,
you would need less food.

So, the device
I am in right now,

it's based on the concept
of indirect calorimetry.

What does this mean?

Calorimetry, so it
measures how much energy
does my body need per day.

It's indirect, because this
is actually measured

by the air that I breathe
in and out.

That's why I'm in this canopy.

In the future,
we can assume that

we will use the same concept
to calculate how much energy
does the body need

also for hibernation.

We know it's gonna be less
than the energy we use
in everyday life.

But as every person
is different,

so one astronaut is different
to another one,

we need to calculate
precisely how much energy
would I need to fly

or much energy would you need,
actually, to fly in space,
in a hibernated state.

Lifeless like
Snow White in a Perspex box,

one wonders what
the astronauts might feel.

Essentially it's like
a state of deep sleep.

But, again,
this is what we know
from researching animals,

and people that, for example,
go into major surgery.

I do not know
if we will have dreams.

We have to ask
the future astronauts on that.

The next step
sounds straight from
a Hollywood script.

Interstellar travelers
could be put into
suspended animation.

Incredibly, this is already
being done today.

But the people pioneering
these radical methods

have nothing to do with
space exploration.

...0.50 now,
he is not breathing.

One, two, three.

At the Maryland
Medical Center,

pioneering surgeons
have masterminded

an innovative procedure
for severe gunshot wounds.

We have
a young male,
multiple gunshot wounds,

penetrating injuries
to the right shoulder region

and two penetrating injuries
to the lower abdomen.

Could we please order
a massive transfusion?

Patients with
extreme bullet injuries have
a survival rate of just 7%.

There just isn't enough time
to fix their wounds.

I think he's in hemorrhagic...
Oh, he's arrested.

Asystole.

Doctors
are working on ways
around the problem.

In order to buy
40 minutes of time,

they have devised a procedure
to slow down the metabolism
of their patients.

By cooling patients rapidly,
they protect the whole body.

The unique aspect
here is that we're preserving
not only specific organs,

but the entire body
and multiple organs,

including the brain,
liver, heart, lungs

and all the other
essential organs,
including the intestines.

Okay, we're gonna
cool him down to 20.

Doctors
replace the blood
with a saline solution,

cooled to 20 degrees Celsius
or 68 degrees Fahrenheit.

Within minutes,
the patient has entered
a state of hypothermia.

This procedure could be
the nucleus of a revolution
in space travel.

I think
we're doing the groundwork,
the fundamentals here,

so I do think that cooling
would be a part, for sure,
of any prolonged

suspended animation
or travel of some sort.

If you can reduce
the body's demand

for oxygen and food
and stuff like that,

then you can go further
and further out

in a space situation,
by doing that, so...

It may not end up
being the final result,

but I think that that
temperature will play
a role in that.

On interstellar
space missions,

the suspended animation
would have to last for months,
even years.

But there is a problem.

So there's a buildup
of a lot of potassium
and acid.

And to successfully
navigate that,

there would need to also be
a process to manage that

and remove the potassium
and neutralize the acid.

To use this method
for long-term space flights,

scientists need to control
the buildup

of acidic waste products
in the cooled astronauts.

So far, this seems
to be impossible.

Even if you could find
a way to freeze humans,

a trip of many millennia would
be far from plain sailing.

Some crew members
would have to be awake
to watch over the spacecraft

and the passenger
support systems.

To keep the mission
going across the centuries,

the crew would have
to renew itself
by having children.

But conceiving offspring
in space is challenging.

In the confines
of a spaceship,

astronauts would have
a limited choice of partners.

Back in Colorado,
there's a man with concerns
about procreating like this.

Simon Dube,
a leading space sexologist,

is worried about
interstellar inbreeding.

If we don't have enough
people on these space flights
or colonies,

it's going to create
a situation where

some individuals will
have to reproduce

with people who have
DNA that are closely
related to one another.

This increases the risk
of genetic diseases
or congenital malformation.

In a situation where
we have long-term

multi-generational
space flight,

we need to find ways
to bring enough genetic
diversity to our sample.

Refreshing
the gene pool would
be essential.

Or, after 5,000 years
of inbreeding,

the crew would arrive
transformed
into bizarre mutants.

Estimates vary
as to how many colonists

would ensure
a healthy gene mix.

Researchers
have estimated

that we might need
up to 40,000 individuals
or maybe even less than 100.

Those who argue
for small numbers

usually take into account
that in these situations,

we might wanna use
genetic technology.

So, for instance,
bringing with us a bank

of fertilized eggs
that will be progressively
implemented

to provide that genetic
diversity in the colony
or aboard the spaceships.

But genetic health
isn't the only sex issue
we need to deal with in space.

Space imposes
all kinds of challenges
on human sexuality,

including partnered sex.

So one of them is the fact
that there's no gravity,

so in zero gravity
or microgravity,

it might be difficult
to bring partners close
to one another,

because each time one
pushes the other,
or makes a movement,

it will propel
the other person away.

So we need to find
contraptions, garments,
or technical systems

to keep people close
from one another,

so that they can enjoy
sexual activities together.

Undeterred
by such perplexing matters,

Simon thinks one shouldn't
view space sex
as a problem.

Imagine what it would mean
to be weightless
for human sexuality.

You could move around.

In zero gravity,
you can enjoy
sexual activities,

including with multiple
partners,

in total weightlessness.

What would that mean
for our sexual behavior,

our preferences
and our fantasies?

I think in a space context,
it would completely
change them

and enable new frontiers
for human sexuality.

Despite
these hopeful prospects,

scientists sending
out colonists
in generation ships

will have to deal
with our bodies.

We are just too frail
to thrive away from Earth.

But, astonishingly,
there is a man
in New York City

who's certain he can
overcome this obstacle.

We meet the NASA geneticist
Christopher Mason

in his laboratory
at Weill Cornell
Medical College.

He knows what
he's up against.

The human body
was never built for space.

There are extraordinarily
difficult terrains

and environments
that we would have
to survive in,

so, sulfuric acid rain
or crushing gravity
or radiation,

that would kill a person
in less than a day.

Even within our solar system,
there's places
we've already seen

that are completely
inhospitable to human life

and we have to find
a way around them.

For every astronaut
that's gone into space, ever,

we have considered physical
protective measures,
pharmacological measures,

to keep them safe
and keep them healthy
and active.

But we now are
on the cusp
of actually implementing

genetic measures,
actually, cellular changes,
that can keep them safe.

So, instead of just having
defenses on the outside
of the body,

we can activate defenses
that are already present
on the inside of the body

and even add new ones.

Up until
a few years ago,

editing the human gene
was science fiction.

Today, geneticists
are on the verge

of making humans fit
for interstellar travel.

The most damaging
threat is radiation.

The biggest risk
of radiation is that it
damages your DNA and proteins

and doesn't let
your cells survive.

So, what we do
is take proteins
from our own DNA,

our own genome
and also from other creatures,
like tardigrades

and take those snippets
of genes we know that give
additional protection

and we basically
copy them out,
clone them

and then put them
into human cells.

Christopher
Mason particularly
enjoys snipping genes

from these droll
micro-animals,
tardigrades.

Tardigrades are these
cute little tiny water bears,
they're often called,

because they look
like a little bear.

And they are a species
that is found in soils

and surfaces
all over the Earth.

They're just small,
little multicellular
little bears,

that can survive
almost anywhere.

High radiation,
they can survive
the vacuum of space,

even come back
and then be rehydrated.

They can survive
dry conditions.

So they're really
extraordinary creatures.

So, now let's go see
if we can check on the cells.

Now, let's see
how the tardigrade
and human cells are doing.

Take a peek at Craig,
who should be in here.

-Hey, Craig.
-Hey.

All right,
so how do they look?

Yeah, we're just spinning
them down right now.

Allowing
the centrifuge
to spin down, great.

These cells
floating in this pink bath

of nutrients, belong
to no species ever known.

They are a completely
artificial blend
of water bear and human.

We've made human cells
that carry the lessons
from the tardigrade

inside their DNA
and enable it to resist

up to 80% more
radiation than they
could before.

All human
cells which carry
the radiation-resistant gene

of tardigrades will
light up under the microscope.

Christopher Mason
is delighted to see

that the experiment
has worked out.

Opening up a pathway
to even more fanciful
genetic modifications.

One of the challenges
is that you have very low
light in long space flight,

you have limited resources.

So what if you captured
every photon and turned
it into food?

Or what if we could have
chlorophyll inside
human cells?

Really like chloro-humans,
or plants, basically.

What if we could just
lay out in the sun
when you're hungry,

get enough nutrients
and then go back in the shade
when you're all full.

To do this in space,
you would need about two
tennis courts' worth of skin

to lay out and get
enough sunlight,

on Earth at least,
to get enough food
for one day.

So if you could imagine
having that much skin
you could kind of roll it out,

let it absorb and then roll
it back in, kind of like
a portable solar panel.

Except it's your own skin.

This new
space superhuman
would know no limits.

It will breathe helium
and dive into
the Boomerang Nebula.

That is, if it ever
sees the light of day.

Our lab
has a 500-year plan
to enact this dream

of having humans survive
under the light of a new sun.

I will be dead
for the vast majority
of this plan,

but the point
is that we've laid out

what can happen
and I think should happen.

We've learned a lot
about genetics
in the past ten years,

that's phase one.

In the next 20 years,
we actually take these lessons
and knowledge of genetics

and engineer these cells,
engineer genomes

to contain lessons
from other creatures

to help them survive
extreme environments.

And by phase ten,
in 500 years,
we actually launch.

We will have had the knowledge
of genetics to know what to do
to protect the astronauts

and we'll have the exoplanets
discovered so we know
to where we can send them.

But if genetically
enhanced humans ever ventured
out to conquer the galaxy,

they would have to adapt
not just their bodies
but their minds.

And that might be an even
more vexing issue.

Our challenge
would be to stay sane.

locked for generations
in a ship on course
into the unknown.

Space anthropologist,
Taylor Genovese,

is convinced we'd be
at each other's throats

before we even
reached halfway.

The day-to-day of living,
as anyone who
has cohabited knows,

the smallest of irritants

can explode
into dramatic fights.

Somebody clinks
their fork on a plate
the wrong way,

can explode into a fight.

The problem becomes
you can't escape it,

you can't remove
yourself to cool down,

because you're always
in close proximity.

The Antarctic stations
are really great

because you can see
how people are going to react

within a very
hostile environment.

In the past few years
there was an apparent issue
that someone on a Russian crew

was giving away the endings
of the books from the library

to another Russian
crew member on purpose,

maliciously telling him
the ends of books.

So much so, that then
the other crew member
could no longer take it,

went into the kitchen,
grabbed a butcher knife

and stabbed
the other crew member.

And they needed
to then, of course,
evacuate them out.

But in outer space,
you're not gonna
be able to have that.

Even more dangerously,
if somebody gets very angry

and decides to, say,
open an airlock
or puncture something

in the settlement
or the spacecraft

then that endangers
everybody on board.

There are going
to be problems.

There are going
to be issues
between people.

And how are we going
to deal with this?
It's not being talked about.

While mental health
on long-term space missions
is a taboo subject

it has been researched
in the past.

In New Jersey, we meet someone
who was a guinea pig

in a Moscow
isolation experiment
in the 1990s.

For the first time,
Canadian nursing professor
Judith Lapierre

breaks her silence
on the Russian study

that was to create
an international scandal.

I was very enthusiastic
about getting involved
in such a big project

because at that time,
it represented the longest
confinement studies

with an international crew
and a mixed-gender crew.

So I was really excited
and proud. This was
a dream come true, actually.

The experiment involved
Judith being locked up

in a large,
metal barrel
for 110 days.

She and the group of men
would live there confined
and observed around the clock.

Judith Lapierre felt primed
for the challenge.

I'm the woman
taking part in this crew

so we are training now
for the starting
of the experiment.

I would have loved, of course,
there would be more women

because I think
it would be great
for me as support, also,

and real life is
involving both genders,
so there should be more,

but unfortunately,
there's only one so far.

On December 4, 1999,
Judith was ready
to be locked in the barrel

as part of an international
crew that was to join
a Russian crew inside.

I remember following
each other in a line
and going inside the chamber,

closing the doors
and there we were starting
our 110 days' mission.

And it was a very intense
schedule, we had over
100 studies to run.

and the days
would last from 8:00
until 10:00 at night.

Judith settled
into her new life,

comfortably dropping
into a work routine
with her colleagues.

From the control room
the supervisors witnessed
how the crew bonded.

Nobody had the slightest
notion that the experiment
was to go disastrously wrong.

The ambience and the dynamic
of the chamber changed

that evening
of New Year's, 2000.

It was a kind
of a celebration
of course,

we had an initial
meal together

and a little after midnight,
there was a fight
between Russian crew members.

It was a very violent
and aggressive fight

that left one
crew member
very injured.

Judith expected
the men in the control room
to intervene...

but no one came.

This was just one
part of an evening

that was to spiral
much further
out of control.

We couldn't sleep
after those incidents

so we stayed
in the living room.

And then the Russian
crew member
was starting to make jokes

about doing an experiment
that would involve myself.

He had stopped smoking
and he wanted to test
kissing without smoking,

in front of everybody.
So I said, "No way,

I'm not gonna take part
in any of this,
what do you mean?"

And he pulled me up
from my chair.
I sat down again.

He pulled me again
and I looked at my friends,
my commander, saying,

"What's he doing now,
he's pulling me out?"

you know, to go
in the kitchen area again.

That's when he decided
that he would kiss me forcibly

and I pushed him away,
he did again
and I pushed him.

And I left the kitchen,
went back to my colleagues

and I was in shock
because that whole evening

had a whole
atmosphere already
and I couldn't believe it.

The next day we did write
to mission control

and to our respective
space agencies.

And it took
until four
to five days,

they sent to us
a paper through
the hatch doors

and they told us
you should sign this

or you may leave,
you're free to go.

And so we were
kind of forced to sign
if we wanted to stay.

And, of course,
I wanted to stay.

The paper
Judith signed

said that the incident
was just a cultural
misunderstanding.

And I can't say no to that.
It was a sexual interest
that he had in me

and he forcibly
kissed me twice
and I rejected him.

But it was not
recognized as such

and it was just minimized as
a cultural misunderstanding.

Saying that I wasn't
open enough to
cultural diversity.

When that mission finished,

it really influenced
my whole career,

because I thought
this would be the start
of my research project

with the Space Agency
or the start of my field
of work.

But I was just totally
pushed out of the system.

And I have not been involved
in any space work ever since.

Drawing on
the experience
of Judith Lapierre,

one concludes that hurtling
through the centuries

in a spaceship,
would end in strife,
crime and depravity.

If we are to stand a chance
to reach exoplanets,

we need to figure out how
to get there in a lifetime.

But could we invent
a spacecraft fast enough?

In Idaho, we are back
with Marshall Savage,

visionary science educator
and futurologist.

Marshall has an idea
how we can supercharge
future spacecraft.

Einstein taught us
energy and matter
are inter-exchangeable,

and a very little bit
of matter is a huge amount
of energy.

But the only real,
viable way to make
that conversion,

to get all the energy
out of a piece of matter,

is by having antimatter.

Because when matter
and antimatter meet,

they annihilate each other
and the result is pure energy.

So, if you could manufacture
and store enough antimatter,

it then becomes possible
to have energy on the scale
of photon propulsion.

What that means is that
instead of hot chemicals
coming out of the rocket,

or fast fusion particles
coming out of the rocket,

you have photons
coming out of the rocket,

and they're traveling
at the speed of light.

Antimatter fuel
would get us around
the galaxy in no time.

As impossible as it may sound,

antimatter is both
already manufactured
and stored on Earth today.

In Geneva,
physicist Michael Doser
harvests antimatter

at the particle
accelerator, CERN.

It's actually pretty easy
to make antimatter
and to work with it.

All you need is
a Proton Synchrotron,

where you accelerate particles
to very high energies,

smash those into
a block of iridium,

and if you're really lucky,
one in a million,

you get a pair
of a proton
and antiproton.

These antiprotons are moving
almost at the speed of light,

rush into this building,

and are then slowed down
in the structures
that you can see here.

So, there's a big
decelerator surrounding
the building itself,

underneath
the concrete blocks.

Then they go down into
this little ring here,

which is the final stage,

which slows them down
to such low energies
that we can catch them.

Making antimatter
is easy, if you happen
to be at CERN,

the world's largest
nuclear research facility.

The center hosts scientists
from 85 nations

and consumes more electricity
than 300,000 homes a year.

CERN might be the home
of some of the biggest
hardware ever built,

but in particle physics
some of the most
impressive gear

can be quite unassuming.

This is the heart
of the matter,
or of the antimatter.

This is what an antimatter
trap looks like,

and this is, in fact,
a trap that we used about
10,15 years ago.

And what you see here is

something that will hold
antimatter without touching
any matter.

Because, of course, when
antimatter and matter touch,
they annihilate.

So we need to hold
the antimatter in vacuum,

and only touch it
with electric fields
and magnetic fields.

Unfortunately,
the amount of energy required

to make antimatter
is enormous.

120 gigawatts are
needed to create even
the tiniest amounts

of this mysterious substance.

And the output
is ridiculously low.

All the antimatter
produced at CERN

wouldn't power
a single lightbulb.

Michael Doser works
with only minute quantities
of antimatter.

And there is another problem.

The sheer amount
of time required to
manufacture antimatter.

At CERN, if the accelerator
were to give us antiprotons
every second,

and we could cool them
down that fast,

we'd end up with something
of the order of a tenth
of a nanogram per year.

Which means, that in order
to get one gram of antimatter
you need 10 billion years,

which just happens to be
the age of the universe.

So if you'd started collecting
antiprotons at the beginning
of the universe,

at the moment of the big bang,

we'd now have 1 gram
of antimatter.

Even if this lengthy
production process
were practical,

could we ever generate
enough fuel to get us
to the next solar system?

Now, to get to Alpha Centauri,
my reference is Star Trek,
which has the Enterprise.

And in the Enterprise
there's this huge warp core
running with antimatter.

That's a couple of tons'
worth of antimatter,

but we can be a bit more
economical than that,
and call it a few kilograms.

Which means that,
not only do you need
10 billion years,

you actually need something
like a factor of 1,000
or 10,000 more than that,

which is probably longer
than the age of the universe
into the future.

And that's the amount of time
you need, under current
technological conditions

to make enough antimatter
to get to Alpha Centauri.

You'd be faster off
walking to get there.

For now,
interstellar space travel

remains in the realm
of science fiction.

Unless, of course,
we get help from
outer space.

If there were
technically-advanced
aliens out there,

we could just ask them
to let us hitch a ride.

Those of us
hoping to get a lift
from a UFO

should best direct
their request to this colony
of extraterrestrials on Earth.

In the Valley of the Dawn,
in Brazil, live people who
believe they are

the descendants
of an alien species
from the planet Capella.

The knowledge about
the extraterrestrial
history of the valley

goes back to this woman,
Tia Neiva.

Born Neiva Zelaya,
Tia Neiva was a truck driver
and single mother of four.

When she died in 1984,
her followers preserved
her house as she had left it.

They even turned her bathroom
into a shrine.

Photographs show how from
the 1960s onwards,

she started receiving
cosmic energy.

The energy is sent down
from the alien mothership

that hovers invisibly
above the valley.

Tia Neiva's followers
are still harvesting
healing rays today

transmitted down
by benevolent aliens.

So could this energy
be used to whisk us away
to faraway planets?

The aliens
of the valley
are stuck on Earth.

In the course of millennia,
their bodies have adapted
to our environment,

so there's no way back
to their home planet.

Watching them draw
energy from outer space,

we were mystified
by the experience.

Which seemed at times
as perplexing as gazing
at a faraway galaxy.

We left the aliens
of the Valley of Dawn

with a certainty
that they would not be able

to whisk us away
in their spacecraft.

Our journey has shown us

that we humans
should not behave
like interplanetary locusts

grazing our planet empty

and then moving onto the next.

But should we be sad
about that?

Since his journeys
to the stars,

astronaut Mike Foale looks
at our planet differently.

I've always loved astronomy.
I've always loved the galaxy.

I've always loved the idea
of being on other planets
around other stars.

But in the end
the thing that drove me
the most was looking at Earth.

The Earth is always changing
and so the light changes,

the seasons change,
the seasons
are always different.

And it's so fascinating,
it's utterly absorbing.

Coming over the southern tip
of South America,
and almost always,

the lighting
is pretty low-angle.

So it has a sort of
deep dark blue.

Almost a mysterious...

It looks cold, it is cold.

But then you notice...

I could see waves.

And you go, "Waves?

From this altitude?
No, no, that can't be right."

Yes, you can see waves,
South Atlantic waves

going all the way
around the planet
at that latitude.

Because they're
so huge driven by
the winds down there,

you can actually see
the combined froth of
all the breaking waves

from space, from orbit,
from hundreds of miles away.

I appreciate the Earth,
and the ecology of the Earth.

And as something I need
to communicate as being
worthwhile looking after,

far more after being in space.

Back at
Mauna Kea, Hawaii,

the telescopes are trained
into the skies

searching for undiscovered
worlds that might one day
be colonized.

Down on the plains,
native Hawaiians have
a very different idea

of what humanity's place
in the cosmos should be.

This is
a highly symbolic place.

In this black wasteland
Nobel Prize-winning science

collides with
indigenous knowledge.

Hawaiian activist
Lanakila Mangauil
pays reverence to the volcano.

For him, Mauna Kea
is a holy mountain

not to be disturbed by humans.

Astronomer Lucianne Walkowicz
has come down from the peak

to listen and learn about
the Hawaiians' beliefs.

Lanakila has agreed
to show Lucianne
how Mauna Kea is honored.

The Hawaiians have
their own cosmology

expressed in these
traditional songs and dances.

Every little step
and gesture has
a significance

connected with
the sacred volcano.

Here on the mountain,
too much human footprints,
or walking,

or shifting of the land

disrupts the natural cycles
of the hydrology.

From the snow, the ice,

and how it needs
to percolate and move.

So we have to allow
the forces of nature
to do its thing.

So that very simple hula,
where you see us dancers

retreating with
this very light tapping

of their fingers
and light tapping
of their feet,

and the backward motion
is to show we should be
exiting these places,

and leave as little
to no imprint at all.

Not even our footprints.

Lanakila sees humans
as a part of creation

and we ignore this
at our peril.

When you break away
from that thinking

or if you think
yourself outside, or worse,

you think yourself
superior to that,

well, this is what you get.

This is not
the indigenous ecosystem
of this land.

This is after human impact.

Has all the native forests
of this mountain be decimated.

So what
do you think
when you hear people

saying that, you know,
now that they have
used the Earth,

they're going to go
to other planets?

Say, planets around
other stars or Mars,
or wherever it happens to be?

It's a scary thought for me

to think of people
wanting to go
and their whole mission

just to go and continue
the extraction process
on other planets.

Absolutely not.

You know, there's so much more
to learn right here.

And so in many cases,
I think it's important

that we need to protect
the rest of the universe
from us.

Lucianne Walkowicz
has drawn conclusions
from this message.

I think
the problem that I have
with colonization

as described
by Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos,

is that it really
does describe colonization.

The idea of going places

and extracting and exploiting.

The same kind of colonization
projected into space

that many people
have experienced
here on Earth.

Now on Earth, we do face
existential threats.

We do have things
like climate change

that are creating
a less habitable world
than the one

that has raised
our species thus far.

And we can't afford
to treat our planet

as though we can
just use it up,

eat everything up,
and throw it away.

We have one home.

Looking at this world
I see such unbelievable,
soul-drenching,

life-supporting richness
and lushness

that exists on
no other planet
that we know of.

And that even if
we were to find a planet
around another star

that we think,
might potentially
be like this,

we would have
no way of knowing,

we have no way of
human beings reaching there
in our lifetimes.

And yet here we are
surrounded by a paradise.

I just feel so humbled by
the planet that we live on.

Especially as someone
who thinks often
of other worlds.

That I can swim in the ocean.

That I can drink from streams.

That I can sit out and feel
the sun on my face.

And I know that it
doesn't just not harm me,

it actually sustains
and nourishes me

and everyone I know,

and everyone
in all of humanity
that has ever lived.