Under the sea
A house by the sea isn’t uncommon, but it takes a true love of the ocean to want to live beneath the sea. Yet when ocean explorer Fabien Cousteau asked MIT senior Grace Young to join his team of aquanauts in living for a month underwater, Young didn’t hesitate.“I said ‘Yes!’ right away,” she says. “It’s great outreach, plus really interesting research.” The expedition, known as Mission 31, will consist of 31 days living in an underwater capsule called Aquarius, 63 feet below the surface in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. Mission 31 will begin in mid-November and, if successful, would break the underwater living record of 30 days currently held by Fabien Cousteau’s grandfather, famed oceanographer Jacques Cousteau.Young, a mechanical and ocean engineering major, will take charge of marine robots on the mission and run daily Skype sessions with K-12 classrooms all over the world — while remaining...