A University of South Florida professor is preparing to go to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean as part of a NASA mission.

Dominic D'Agostino, who studies how extreme environments affect the human body, is one of four crew members - and the only non NASA or European Space Agency member.Starting next week, the team will spend ten days in a underwater habitat six miles off the coast of Key Largo.

D'Agostino says their mission will mirror that of a deep space mission to Mars.

"So it's very important to understand things like how living in a stressful habitat and being task-loaded can impact our physical abilities and our cognitive function and what they call 'team cognition' - working together as a crew", said D'Agostino.

D'Agostino's wife, who is a neuroscientist at USF, will serve as a member of NASA's support team and conduct a number of tests on her husband and his teammates.