Here on Earth, life has endured heat, cold and cataclysm, has emerged from the sea to inhabit the land and the air, and — in human form — has touched the Moon. Someday we might carry the torch of life still farther outward to find a home on the planet Mars. If Mars proves to be sterile, we could make it suitable for life by transforming its environment through a global engineering approach called terraforming.

	Terraforming Mars would mean providing the red planet with life's three requisites — water, energy and organic molecules. There is water there already. Human technology might provide the organics and boost the amount of available energy. In one plan, giant mirrors in space would warm the surface, while genetically engineered plants and trees replenished the atmosphere. Over time the red planet would bloom with the greens and blues of life. Eventually the air would become breathable, and the great-great grandchildren of the first colonists might fish and farm under the blue skies of a terraformed Mars.

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