If we want to colonize space, we really, really need some kind of base outside of the Earth?s atmosphere, preferably on the Moon — but Mars would be good, too. If we ever want to colonize other planets, it is vital that we find a way of extracting these vital gases and liquids from moons and planets, rather than transporting them from Earth (which is prohibitively expensive, due to Earth?s gravity). The current plan is to land a rover on the Moon in 2018 that will try to extract hydrogen, water, and oxygen — and then hopefully, Curiosity?s successor will try to convert the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere into oxygen in 2020 when it lands on Mars. In 2018, NASA hopes to put a rover on the Moon that will carry the RESOLVE (Regolith and Environment Science and Oxygen & Lunar Volatile Extraction) science payload. There is also some evidence that there?s water ice on the surface of the Moon — RESOLVE will find out for certain by heating the soil and seeing of water vapor emerges.Experiment will probably suck in carbon dioxide from the Martian atmosphere, filter out the dust, and then process the CO2 into oxygen. Basically, as it stands, space travel needs lots of hydrogen and oxygen (rocket propellant) and water (to keep astronauts alive). Water has the unfortunate characteristic of being both heavy and incompressible, meaning it?s very difficult and expensive to lift large amounts of it into space (gravity can be really annoying sometimes). Likewise, unless we come up with some other way of powering our spacecraft, it?s infeasible to carry the rocket fuel that we?d need for exploration from Earth. Source:extremetech.com