Presented at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Space 2003 meetings in Long Beach, California on 24 September 2003, Session: Human Factors Support for Long-Duration Missions Design Implications of Latent Challenges to the Long-Duration Space Mission Marilyn Dudley-Rowley OPS-Alaska & Sonoma State University Sociology Department, 1801 East Cotati Avenue., Rohnert Park, California 94928 USA, 707-773-1037 (tel. & fax), MD-R@ops-alaska.com Jun Okushi Space Projects Group, Okushi Architects, Mito, JAPAN jokushi@beige.ocn.ne.jp Thomas Gangale OPS-Alaska & San Francisco State University TEG@ops-alaska.com Pablo Flores Moscow Aviation Technical Institute astrostation@Hotmail.com Eduardo Diaz Sonoma State University phd@smartlacarte.com ABSTRACT While expansion of space industry engineering standards over any human factors interface, except the human- technology interface, is a still a relatively new topic (Dudley-Rowley & Bishop, 2002), even rarer still is the consideration of the latent challenges of long-duration space missions. A latent challenge in this venue could be a social, behavioral, or a natural or human-engineered environmental phenomenon. Manifest challenges to long-duration spaceflight are numerous enough, with mission planners, managers, and engineers taking into account obvious things like spacecraft operations, communications difficulties, having enough onboard resources, and protection of crew from an airless, microgravity environment fraught with radiation and other hazards. Latent challenges are harder to grasp. A latent challenge is any item, aspect, component, or process that potentially poses difficulties in the performance of mission objectives, but is something about which not much is known. However, a mission to Mars is a long-duration space mission that is a significantly different experience than a tour-of-duty of the same duration aboard a space station in full view of Earth, with easier access to new or needed equipment, more supplies, or even returnability. Social and behavioral phenomena in such an extreme environment could generate their own set of latent challenges. What steps could the crew take to ensure a high level of group functioning and minimize the impact to the accomplishment of mission objectives? How might design offset latent challenges on long-duration space missions? This report attempts to catalog the types of latent challenges that could pose difficulties to the long- duration space mission, and then gives a multidisciplinary perspective of how design could respond to these challenges. Keywords: Man-System Integration Standards, human factors interfaces, latent challenges, long-duration space missions, multidisciplinary perspectives on design HISTORY OF IDEAS While expansion of space industry engineering standards over any human factors interface, except the human-technology interface, is still a relatively new topic (Dudley-Rowley & Bishop, 2002), even rarer still is the consideration of the latent challenges of long-duration space missions. A latent challenge in this venue could be a social, behavioral, or a natural or human-engineered environmental phenomenon. Manifest challenges to 1 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics