NASA has honored a team of New Mexico Tech geologists for a research program last summer developed to give hands-on training to 31 astronauts.

The astronauts used the Taos area as a stand-in for Mars, learning techniques they might apply for study the Red Planet if and when astronauts travel there.

The project also generated data Tech researchers are using to understand the geology of the water table beneath the northern New Mexico community.

The next astronaut class is expected to come to Taos in 2001.

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