by Jeff Foust - June 12, 2018
NASA is continuing to study concepts for Mars sample return, including roles by international and commercial partners, with no firm decisions until late next year. Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech
WASHINGTON - Recent discoveries that the planet once did, and still live, habitable, have been offered by the recent discoveries, despite the late next year, despite NASA doesnt expect the late next year.
Scientists working on data from the Curiosity Mars rover announced the discovery of organic molecules in ancient Martian rocks, as well as martian atmospheres in methane concentrations of seasonal variations.
While both discoveries are consistent with the existence of past or present life, they are alone not evidence since both the organic molecules and methane gas production are described by alternatives, non-biological processes. However, they are the scientists who have more data to determine the habitability of Mars
NASA's Associate Administrator for Science said, "With these new findings, Mars is telling us to stay the course and keep searching for evidence of life," discoveries about a June 7 statement in NASA. "I am confident that our ongoing and planned missions will unlock even more breathtaking discoveries on the red planet. "
Among those planned missions is Mars sample return, a multi-mission architecture that involves collecting samples of Martian rock and regolith and caching them for a later mission. That mission then the Martian orbit in the samples, where a spacecraft would be retrieved and send them to Earth
NASA's Mars 2020 rover will carry out the first phase of that effort by caching samples. Future steps remain undefined, although the agency's leadership says that the Mars sample return is a priority.
"Certainly, Mars sample return is something that we are committed to as an agency," said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine in a June 6 briefing with reporters. "That's a civilization-level changing capability, and we want to do it."
In August 2017, Zurbuchen unveiled a concept for "lean" Mars sample return that returning samples from Mars, such as additional orbiters that provided communications or reconnaissance services. picked up the cached samples and the spacecraft that collected the samples in orbit for return to Earth. The goal is to return samples to the 2020s.
That's the basic concept remains under study, Zurbuchen said on June 8, Space Transportation Association luncheon. "Nobody has set the architecture," he said. "What we're doing is a variety of options" that include participation by both international and commercial partners
He noted that NASA's 2019 budget proposal included $ 50 million to support planning for Mars sample return efforts. That funding line remained flat for later years in the budget proposal, a more detailed mission architecture of pending development.
"We're going to give a lot more clarity about what that means exactly the next budget cycle," he said.However, he did not expect those plans to fall in place until late next year. "The first time we ' We're going to have a really straightforward joint venture in the United States, but it's not a decision this week or next week or next month. "
Both Bridenstine and Zurbuchen emphasized the importance of Mars in the sample return in that it can provide scientists for hands-on access to samples that can be analyzed in laboratories far more sophisticated than any other spacecraft to determine if the Mars has, or has, life .
"Who's the first to find life on another planet? Who's the first to find evidence there was life on another planet? That's why that's important," Bridenstine said. "We're committed to Mars sample return. first to discover life on another planet, I think it's a great idea. I think it's something we ought to be doing. "
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