HOUSTON (CNN) -- I had a great week in Houston last week. The CNN team got to look at the new redesigned space suit that will be used on the new International Space Station.

It's much easier to adapt for individual astronauts than anything that's flown in space before. The new suit looks similar to the older NASA suit, in that it has pants and a top. The difference is that the new suit can be expanded or shrunk to fit individual astronaut bodies with a series of metal rings in the arm and leg joints. The upper torso is hard fiberglass and comes in several sizes. Just so you'll know, I fit in the large.

NASA astronauts practice emergency procedures in underwater training facility.
I got to talk to a half-dozen astronauts who are completing their initial space suit training. They get into the suit at the huge 40 foot-deep water tank at Johnson Space Center, and after spending four sessions learning about the suit and how it works, they simulate a specific task. Right now, they're conducting an exercise on what they'd have to do if the shuttle was docked with the space station and the automatic undocking system failed. Two astronauts would have to go outside and disconnect more than 90 huge bolts that hold the two ships together. It's a tough workout, and the astronauts we talked with inside their suits were huffing and puffing shortly after beginning work.

I also got to look at NASA's version of virtual reality. The lab doesn't look like much, but once you put on the VR headset, you start flying around the shuttle and the space station and with special gloves you can move your hands and arms around to accomplish specific tasks.

Spacewalker Jeff Wisoff was in the lab the day I stopped by. He was working to simulate the astronaut jet pack that would be used in case a spacewalker got disconnected from his spaceship. NASA calls it SAFER. It's a microwave oven-sized box that mounts on the front of the spacesuit with small jets that could be used by an astronaut in an emergency to fly back to safety.

Prototype of "plasma" engine that could revolutionize space flight
The most amazing thing I saw this week was the rocket engine of the future. It's been the life's work of astronaut Franklin Chang-Diaz. He started working on the plasma engine in college, and now, at age 48, he's got a demonstration version of the engine in his lab in Houston. The scale model is about 30 feet long.

I'm not a plasma physicist, but Chang-Diaz is, and he explains the engine this way: You put a small amount of hydrogen into one end of the engine. It's turned into plasma, a burning gas as hot as the surface of the sun. Radio waves from an on-board transmitter are used to create the plasma and then a series of electromagnets that circle the central chamber keep the plasma from touching the metal sides of the engine. The super-hot plasma is then moved down to the exhaust nozzle, where is pushes the engine away.

Unlike engines that use solid or liquid fuel, the plasma engine is much more efficient. Chang-Diaz says it gets more miles per gallon than you can imagine. In addition, it's much faster than anything in use today. It can travel from the Earth to Mars in 90 days. That's twice as fast as current technology allows.

Chang-Diaz is working with a group of college students to develop the engine and one of them, Lenny Cassady, has worked out a flight plan. He believes it will be ready to launch on May 16, 2018. That's about the time Lenny says he'd be ready to fly the plasma-powered spaceship to Mars.

The next two months will be hectic for people who care about space coverage. Shuttle Discovery is going to travel to the launch pad on September 21, and John Glenn and his crew will spend time at the Cape preparing for launch the second week in October. Over the next couple of months, I urge you to continue to check our John Glenn special section for updates on Glenn and his crewmates.