Now hiring: IOM3 imagines the careers of 2076
For National Engineering Day 2026, IOM3 looks 50 years ahead with two fictional jobs exploring how materials, minerals and mining expertise could help people live on Mars.
IOM3 is marking National Engineering Day (4 November) with two imaginary vacancies: Extraterrestrial Materials Repair Specialist and Martian Mineral Hunter.
National Engineering Day celebrates the role of engineering and encourages young people to explore engineering careers. This year’s campaign asks us to imagine the engineers and skills we could need in 2076.
While our vacancies may sound like science fiction, the skills behind them are very real.
Could you keep Mars running?
Our first vacancy is for an Extraterrestrial Materials Repair Specialist.
Mars has extreme temperatures, radiation and abrasive dust. If equipment breaks, getting replacement parts from Earth could take months.
The role would involve developing self-healing materials that can detect damage and repair themselves, helping to keep habitats, vehicles and spacesuits safe and operational.
It’s a futuristic challenge, but developing materials that last longer, perform better and can respond to damage is already an important area of materials science and engineering.
Or hunt for minerals on Mars?
Our second vacancy is for a Martian Mineral Hunter.
The challenge? Finding the minerals and resources needed to build homes and infrastructure on Mars, then working out how to turn Martian rocks and dust into useful materials.
On Earth, understanding mineral resources, extracting and processing them responsibly, and turning raw materials into useful products are already essential skills. They could be just as important for future life beyond our planet.
Whether we’re building more sustainable infrastructure on Earth or creating habitats on Mars, we’ll need people who understand what things are made from, where the resources we depend on come from, and how materials can be made to work better.
The engineers of 2076 could be choosing their subjects at school today.
National Engineering Day is coordinated annually by the Royal Academy of Engineering. This year the Academy marks its 50th anniversary with a campaign looking fifty years ahead.
