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Mars Sample Return Mission

 

 
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Mars Sample Return Mission
 
 
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A Mars Sample Return Mission would be a spaceflight
Spaceflight

Spaceflight is the use of space technology to achieve the flight of spacecraft into and through outer space.Spaceflight is used in space exploration, and also in commercial activities like space tourism and telecommunications satellite....
 mission to collect rock and dust samples from Mars
MARS

In cryptography, MARS is a block cipher that was IBM's submission to the Advanced Encryption Standard process. MARS was selected as an AES finalist in August 1999, after the AES2 conference in March 1999, where it was voted as the fifth and last finalist algorithm....
 and to return them
Sample return mission

A sample return mission is a spacecraft mission with the goal of returning tangible samples from an Wiktionary:extraterrestrial#Adjective location to Earth for analysis....
 to Earth
Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun. Earth is the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in diameter, mass and density. It is also referred to as the World and Wiktionary:Terra.Note that by International Astronomical Union convention, the term "Terra" is used for naming extensive land masses, rather...
 for analysis. One particular proposal, a joint project between NASA
NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is an agency of the Federal government of the United States, responsible for the nation's public list of space agencies....
 and ESA, is scheduled to launch in 2018 and the sample return is expected in the the timeframe 2020-2022.

scenario of the joint NASA/ESA mission will depend on the date of launch and performance of the launcher.






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A Mars Sample Return Mission would be a spaceflight
Spaceflight

Spaceflight is the use of space technology to achieve the flight of spacecraft into and through outer space.Spaceflight is used in space exploration, and also in commercial activities like space tourism and telecommunications satellite....
 mission to collect rock and dust samples from Mars
MARS

In cryptography, MARS is a block cipher that was IBM's submission to the Advanced Encryption Standard process. MARS was selected as an AES finalist in August 1999, after the AES2 conference in March 1999, where it was voted as the fifth and last finalist algorithm....
 and to return them
Sample return mission

A sample return mission is a spacecraft mission with the goal of returning tangible samples from an Wiktionary:extraterrestrial#Adjective location to Earth for analysis....
 to Earth
Earth

Earth is the third planet from the Sun. Earth is the largest of the terrestrial planets in the Solar System in diameter, mass and density. It is also referred to as the World and Wiktionary:Terra.Note that by International Astronomical Union convention, the term "Terra" is used for naming extensive land masses, rather...
 for analysis. One particular proposal, a joint project between NASA
NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is an agency of the Federal government of the United States, responsible for the nation's public list of space agencies....
 and ESA, is scheduled to launch in 2018 and the sample return is expected in the the timeframe 2020-2022.

Proposed mission profile

The scenario of the joint NASA/ESA mission will depend on the date of launch and performance of the launcher. Before 2018, only launchers such as Ariane 5
Ariane 5

Ariane 5 is a European expendable launch system designed to deliver payloads into geostationary transfer orbit or low Earth orbit.It is manufactured under the authority of the European Space Agency and the Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales , with EADS Astrium Space Transportation as prime contractor, leading a consortium of sub-contracto...
 and the US EELV
EELV

The Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle is a United States government program, primarily a United States Department of Defense?sponsored effort begun in the 1990s....
 are available, while after 2018, the Ares V
Ares V

The Ares V is the cargo launch component of Project Constellation. Ares V will launch the Earth Departure Stage and Altair when NASA returns to the Moon, which is currently planned for 2019....
 should be available, allowing simpler mission scenarios.

The mission will consist of an orbiter
Orbiter

An orbiter is a space probe that orbits a planet or natural satellite without landing on it in order to study its surface from a distance....
, a lander
Lander (spacecraft)

A lander is a spacecraft which descends toward and comes to rest on the surface of an astronomical body. For bodies with Celestial body atmosphere, the landing is called re-entry and the lander descends as a re-entry vehicle....
, and possibly a rover
Rover (space exploration)

A rover is a space exploration vehicle designed to move across the surface of a planet or other astronomical body. Some rovers have been designed to transport members of a human spaceflight crew; others have been partially or fully autonomous robots....
. The orbiter is designed to deliver the lander/rover probe to Mars and return sample rocks back to Earth for analysis. The lander will feature an ascent component in order to deliver the samples to the orbiter (in case of launch with Ares V the orbiter part can be skipped in favor of a direct ascent scenario).

The rover's main objective is to collect a variety of rock samples using many instruments provided by scientists from NASA and ESA. If the rover is canceled, the lone lander would possibly have a robotic arm and/or hand to collect rock samples in replacement. But the lander could also have a proposed drilling machine to take samples from the Martian interior.

Scientific use

The return of Mars samples would be beneficial to science by allowing more extensive analysis to be undertaken of the samples than could be done by instruments painstakingly transferred to Mars. Also, the presence of the samples on Earth would allow scientific equipment to be used on stored samples, even years and decades after the sample return mission.

The sample would also undergo laboratory examination for living or dead life forms. However, the difficulty of providing and maintaining life support over the months of transit from Mars to Earth remains to be solved. Providing for still unknown environmental and nutritional requirements is daunting. Should dead life forms be found in a sample, it would be difficult to conclude that those organisms were alive when obtained.

See also

  • Mars meteorite
    Mars meteorite

    A Mars meteorite is a meteorite that has landed on Earth and originated from Mars . This could have been the result of an impact of a celestial body on Mars, sending material from Mars into space....
  • Comparison of embedded computer systems on board the Mars rovers
    Comparison of embedded computer systems on board the Mars rovers

    The embedded system computer systems on board the various rovers sent to planet Mars by organisations such as the NASA have to withstand the high radiation levels and large temperature changes in space, and for this reason their computational resources are limited....


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