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A space marine is a fiction type of soldier in science fiction that operates in outer space. Historical marines fulfill amphibious roles: ship defense, landing parties, and general high-mobility deployments. By extension, space marines defend spaceships, land on planets and satellites, and fulfill rapid deployment throughout space.

The first space marine unit, the Galactic Marines, was used in E. E. Smith's Lensman series, published starting in 1937.

The phrase "space marines" first appears in Robert A. Heinlein's "Misfit" (1939) and is again used in "The Long Watch" (1941). Heinlein's Starship Troopers (1959) is considered the defining work for the concept; for example, the actors playing the Colonial Marines in Aliens (1986) were required to read Starship Troopers as part of their training prior to filming. Heinlein intended for the capsule troopers of the Mobile Infantry to be an amalgam of the shipborne aspect of the US Marine Corps relocated to space and coupled with the battlefield delivery and mission profile of US Army paratroopers.

As a gaming concept, space marines play a major role in the Warhammer 40,000 miniatures wargame, in which they are genetically altered super-soldiers and the most powerful fighting forces available to the Imperium of Man. In computer games, playing a space marine in action games was popularized by id Software's Doom series, first published in 1993. It is a convenient game back-story as it excuses the presence of the character on a hostile alien world with little support and heavy weaponry. Some critics have suggested it has been overused to the point of being an action game cliché.

Space Marines has not been a contender in any CBUB matches.