PHOBOS is a name you are going to hear a lot in the coming years. It may be little more than an asteroid - just two-billionths of the mass of our planet, with no atmosphere and hardly any gravity - yet the largest of Mars's two moons is poised to become our next outpost in space, our second home. Although our own moon is enticingly close, its gravity means that relatively large rockets are needed to get astronauts to and from the surface. The same goes for Mars, making it expensive to launch missions there too

We have all seen the famous humanoid face-shaped rock from mars but we know it’s not real, these images and shapes are caused by natural erosion due to the weather patterns and, if you look hard enough and long enough, you will find whatever your mind wants to find, from human faces to pyramids. I myself am not a lunatic, neither do I believe in conspiracy theories, I believe in mathematics and science but I still have an open mind. Something though caught my attention yesterday, whilst watching an interview from last year with Buzz Aldrin. He spoke about space travel and the reasons we should be going back to the moon and even landing on asteroids. I know it was probably a lot of spin to get people talking about and therefore funding space travel, but what he said next definitely got my attention. He spoke about the moons of Mars, saying that on the moon Phobos there is a monolith and that when people see this they will start asking questions about it, some will say God put it there and others will say the universe put it there. These were his words and there is a definite glint in his eye when he speaks about the monolith.

Scientists are proposing splitting an ambitious multibillion-dollar mission to return samples from Mars into three pieces to ease budget concerns, officials said this week. Speaking to reporters from an astrobiology conference in Houston, researchers said the next round of robotic missions to explore the solar system will be better equipped to hunt for past or present life. The holy grail of those missions is a project to collect soil samples from Mars and return them to Earth. Officials did not disclose a predicted cost for the mission, but it will be expensive enough to warrant a joint endeavor between NASA and the European Space Agency. A joint Mars exploration initiative finalized last year between NASA and ESA calls for a cooperative sample return mission some time in the 2020s. The sample return effort would follow joint orbiters and landers launching in 2016, 2018 and 2020.

As Russia celebrates 49 years since the first manned orbital launch, head of the national space agency has outlined its immediate plans. He brings bad news for tourists and optimism for a Mars satellite sampling mission. Next year, a Phobos-Grunt mission is to travel to Mars’ satellite. The automated craft will sample Phobos’ soil and return with it to Earth. Another prospective project is the development of a nuclear spacecraft engine. Roscosmos estimates the project at several billion dollars and plans to publish first design details in 2012. The engine will be ready for testing in space by 2018, Perminov said.

Rocket engines could benefit from a natural Martian lubricant - but not to keep them oiled. A salty sludge that may be lubricating the ice caps of Mars could one day provide fuel. The ice is too cold to flow normally. But if winds were to carry salty soil particles to the ice cap, they might gradually sink to form a briny bed, kept liquid by the planet's warmth. This could allow the ice cap to flow like a glacier, say David Fisher at the Geological Survey of Canada in Ottawa, and colleagues. Such brine would freeze as it moved toward lower temperatures at the edge of the ice cap, forming a ring of concentrated salt. This could one day be mined as a component of solid rocket fuel, says Fisher.

NASA's original exobiology plan called for 100 missions to be flown to Mars by this time. But reality has fallen far short of the plan. NASA's proposals for a Mars sample return have been stymied repeatedly, due to cost and logistical considerations. Over the past couple of years, scientists have been closing in on another sample return concept - and the radical shift in NASA's space vision, announced just this month, could conceivably bring the plan for bringing back Mars life into sharp focus. Here's the current timeline, as laid out by the Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group, or MEPAG:

A returning spacecraft may someday hurtle through Earth's atmosphere bearing evidence of life from Mars. But scientists won't casually crack open the precious payload in any old laboratory. They will need a specially-designed building that not only protects the Martian samples from terrestrial contamination, but also prevents any Martian material or organisms from escaping into Earth's biosphere. Such a Mars sample return mission could signal a huge scientific coup for understanding the red planet's ability to harbor life, and so NASA launched the initial phases of a sample return mission in the late 1990s. Programmatic considerations, including technical and budgetary concerns, killed the mission planning early on, but the U.S. space agency continued to study what type of sample return facility (SRF) might become necessary for such a mission. Now NASA's Mars team has released the results of that study. Three architectural firms drew up plans for how humans and robots could handle extraterrestrial samples within special facilities.

The US and European space agencies have signed the "letter of intent" that ties together their Mars programmes. The agreement, which was penned in Washington DC, gives the green light to scientists and engineers to begin the joint planning of Red Planet missions. The union will start with a European-led orbiter in 2016, and continue with surface rovers in 2018, and then perhaps a network of landers in 2018. The ultimate aim is a mission to return Mars rock and soils to Earth labs.

ESA and the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) will be co-hosting, in cooperation with NASA and the International Mars Exploration Working Group (IMEWG), an International Conference on 9 and 10 July in the Auditorium of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in Paris* to discuss the next step in the exploration of Mars. We are still collecting data under NASA’s Phoenix, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Mars Exploration Rover and Mars Odyssey missions, as well as under ESA’s Mars Express mission, as we prepare for even more exciting missions to come, notably NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory and ESA’s ExoMars. Mars exploration is continuing at a steady pace and future missions will integrate scientific payloads and technologies that will eventually serve the ultimate goal of carrying out a manned mission to Mars. The international community has for a long time agreed that the next imperative step, one which will exponentially increase our knowledge and understanding of the Red Planet and its environment, is a Sample Return Mission.

International planning is under way to reinvigorate plans for a Mars sample return mission, with researchers assessing science priorities and strategies to maximize the scientific output from such an undertaking. Over the last several years, an armada of orbital and surface missions has revealed Mars to be surprisingly more complex than once thought, imbued with a variety of distinct environments — each of value in terms of possible scientific payback given a sample return effort. Mars samples returned to state-of-the-art Earth laboratories are considered by many to be the only way to unravel a host of unresolved questions about the red planet. A sample return mission also is viewed by many as a key tool to help space agencies prepare for future human expeditions to Mars.

China and Russia plan to launch a joint mission to Mars in 2009 to scoop up rocks from the red planet and one of its moons, a Chinese scientist said on Wednesday. Russia will launch the spacecraft, while China will provide the survey equipment to carry out the unmanned exploration, Ye Peijian, a senior scientist at the Chinese Academy of Space Technology, told a meeting in Beijing, according to the official Xinhua news agency. The mission will be another step in China's ambitious program to jump to the forefront of space exploration.

The Russian Cabinet on Tuesday approved a nine-year government program to expand its space programs, backing the ongoing development of the new Clipper spacecraft as well as building Russia's segment of the international space station. In its statement, the Federal Space Agency did not say how much funding the programs would receive. But it said the government plans include a new project called the Phobos-Grunt, which will be sent to the Martian moon of Phobos to collect soil samples. By the end of 2006, the space agency will begin work on preparations for a manned trip to Mars.

Future hunts for past or present life on Mars, hauling back to Earth samples of martian rock and soil, as well as setting the stage for a human voyage to the red planet is taking on a decidedly European look. European Space Agency (ESA) officials are taking steps to shift into high gear the building of the ExoMars robotic rover mission. The lander would be launched in 2011, likely onboard a Soyuz Fregat 2b booster from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana.

NASA’s Mars program could undergo major alternation, driven by budgetary and technical issues, as well as science goals. “We’ve been getting inputs, advice, actions items…from the road mapping teams,” said Doug McCuistion, Mars Exploration Program Director at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. “Nothing is finalized at this point. There have been no final decisions made or, frankly, any interim decisions made as yet.”

The Aurora mission first includes a return capsule to be launched in 2011 and put into orbit around Mars. Two years later, a second spacecraft carrying a descent module and ascent vehicle will be launched on a similar trajectory. During its final approach to Mars, the descent module and ascent vehicle will be released and make a controlled landing on the planet. Carrying its precious samples, the ascent vehicle will later lift off from the surface, then rendezvous with the first craft. After receiving the canister loaded with Martian rocks, it will return to Earth.

NASA's Spirit Rover has just completed a long hard slog across difficult Martian terrain to reach the Columbia hills. The short journey of just a couple of kilometres has taken Spirit months. Imagine if it could thoroughly analyze an area and then just pick up and fly somewhere new? NASA is considering a proposal from Pioneer Astronautics, which envisions a vehicle that could land on Mars, refuel with local materials, and then fly hundreds of kilometres to explore; repeating this process over and over again - the Martian Gashopper Aircraft.

Five spacecraft are circling Mars and creeping across its ruddy surface, looking for traces of long-gone waters and signs that the cold, arid planet may once have been hospitable to life. The robotic martian invasion - three orbiters and two six-wheeled rovers - has already uncovered strong evidence that water once flowed on Mars and is now locked in subsurface ice. But big questions about water on Mars remain. When did it flow? How long did it last? How much was there? Where did it come from? Where did it go? Perhaps the most tantalizing question: Were there long-lived watery environments where microbial life could have gained a foothold?

Epsom-like salts believed to be common on Mars may be a major source of water there, say geologists at Indiana University Bloomington and Los Alamos National Laboratory. In their report in this week's Nature, the scientists also speculate that the salts will provide a chemical record of water on the Red Planet. "The Mars Odyssey orbiter recently showed that there may be as much as 10 percent water hidden in the Martian near-surface," said David Bish, Haydn Murray Chair of Applied Clay Mineralogy at IU and a co-author of the report. "We were able to show that under Mars-like conditions, magnesium sulfate salts can contain a great deal of water. Our findings also suggest that the kinds of sulfates we find on Mars could give us a lot of insight into the history of water and mineral formation there."

Russia is planning to launch a spacecraft to one of Mars’ moons as early as 2009, the nation’s Federal Space Agency announced. The Federal Space Program is currently developing the Phobos-Grunt project,“ the Interfax news agency quoted the agency’s director, Anatoly Perminov, as saying. ”The flight… is planned for 2009.“

The UK is almost certainly going back to Mars and is set to become a major player in Europe's efforts to explore the Solar System. Science minister Lord Sainsbury says the country will pay the £5m interim subscriptions needed to maintain a premier place in the Aurora programme. Aurora sets out a vision for Europe to visit the planets with robotic probes and perhaps one day even with humans.

NASA’s Genesis sample capsule not only stirred up dust and dirt when it crash landed in Utah last week, but also debate concerning the return to Earth of future extraterrestrial samples – specifically from Mars. The Genesis probe, along with the homeward bound Stardust spacecraft carrying bits of a comet and interstellar particles, serve as precursor missions to snag, bag, and lug back to Earth select pieces of Martian real estate. NASA engineers and scientists have been grappling for decades with methods, procedures, and the price tag for robotically returning Mars samples.

Those twin robots hard at work on Mars have transmitted teasing views that reinforce the prospect that microbial life may exist on the red planet. Results from NASA’s Spirit and Opportunity rovers are being looked over by a legion of planetary experts, including a scientist who remains steadfast that his experiment in 1976 proved the presence of active microbial life in the topsoil of Mars. "All factors necessary to constitute a habitat for life as we know it exist on current-day Mars," explained Gilbert Levin, executive officer for science at Spherix Incorporated of Beltsville, Maryland.

Texas A&M University and NASA are teaming up to bring new levels of planetary protection against forward contamination of other worlds from our space probes. The team hopes to sterilize future hardware using a well-known technique called electron beam irradiation.

Somewhere over a wide stretch of Arizona desert today, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory will perform its best impersonation of James Bond. For a scientific facility best known for shipping six-wheeled rovers to Mars and flinging probes to the far corners of the solar system, the terrestrial exercises might seem a bit mundane. Then again, none of those missions ever involved stunt pilots or helicopters snatching a space probe from midair. This will be the first sample of space material returned to Earth since Apollo 17 came back from the moon in 1972. Other samples, however, will follow — from comets and asteroids and even Mars — as scientists seek to bring extraterrestrial materials back to Earth, where the full array of scientific instruments can be brought to bear on every rock and cosmic mite.

Since it was awarded a contract to study the feasibility of return samples of Mars back Earth, EADS Space has come up with two different directions. The first is to launch the sample ascent vehicle from the surface of Mars and dock with the return vehicle in space. In the second design, the ascent vehicle would reach orbit and then eject the samples for the return vehicle to "catch". How the samples are returned to Earth will make a big difference on the mission's cost, mass and complexity.

Following award of the study contract by the European Space Agency, EADS Space has made significant progress in completing the first definition of a European Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission. While EADS Astrium is defining the overall mission and the spacecraft, EADS Space Transportation is responsible for the re-entry systems and a 'Mars Ascent Vehicle' - a small rocket to carry the precious sample up through the Martian atmosphere.

Following award of the [EURO] 600k study contract by ESA, EADS Space has made significant progress in completing the first definition of a European Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission. While EADS Astrium is defining the overall mission and the spacecraft, EADS Space Transportation is responsible for the re-entry systems and a 'Mars Ascent Vehicle' - a small rocket to carry the precious sample up through the Martian atmosphere.

A MARSNEWS.COM EXCLUSIVE

In another stunning development, ESA officials have confirmed to MarsNews.com that the sample canisters launched by the twin Mars Exploration Rovers into Mars orbit have been successfully retrieved by a previously undisclosed Mars Sample Return Vehicle (MSRV) orbiting the Red Planet.

ESA's MSRV spacecraft (built by France) arrived at Mars late last year as part of the Mars Express mission and carries a new propulsion system which our contacts at ESA have remained tight-lipped about.

Colorado, a space industry "powerhouse," could corner up to half of the contracts in a nearly $3 billion proposed mission to bring martian rocks and soil back to Earth for study. The state's know-how includes Lockheed Martin Space Systems' Atlas rockets, which could power a craft to Mars; Ball Aerospace's expertise in snaring samples and sealing them against contamination; and the University of Colorado's skill in recognizing the signature of fossilized life forms.

EADS Space has been awarded a EUR600k Study by ESA to carry out the first definition of a European Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission. The study will benefit from the combined resources of EADS Astrium and EADS Space Transportation. While EADS Astrium will define the overall mission and the spacecraft, EADS Space Transportation will be responsible for defining re-entry systems and a 'Mars Ascent Vehicle' - a small rocket to carry the precious sample up through the Martian atmosphere.

Europe intends to go head to head with the US in a race to capture a piece of Mars and bring it back to Earth in the next chapter of the search for life on the Red Planet. A European mission to scoop up half a kilogram of Martian rocks and carry them home for analysis will blast off in 2011, European Space Agency officials have announced. While the two space agencies prefer to be seen as partners, their increasing emphasis on Mars exploration is inevitably lending an edge of rivalry to their efforts.

In 2007 an automatic space probe is going to bring to Earth soil samples from Martian satellite Phobos. Academician Erik Galimov said this on Tuesday at the sitting of the presidium of the Russian Academy of Sciences, where problems and prospects of space research of the Moon and other planets were in discussion. Galimov said that the Phobos-Soil project, jointly with the Russian Space Agency (Rosaviakosmos), is the closest and so far only Russian project for the study of planets in the Solar system.

If experts hope to prove that Mars harbors some form of life, or once did, they will probably have to retrieve pieces of soil and rock and return them to Earth for analysis. That task will likely fall to a robotic spacecraft sometime in the next decade. Though part of a long-term effort by NASA to solve that mystery, neither the Spirit nor Opportunity missions is equipped to make that determination. Instead, the robotic rovers will look for evidence in the rocks and soil of Mars that the arid planet was once wet and warm.

What is the next best thing to humans landing on Mars and exploring the wonders of the Red Planet? The answer: touching, imaging and analysing carefully preserved samples of Martian rock in a state-of-the-art laboratory on Earth. If all goes according to plan, this is exactly what ESA's long-term Aurora programme of Solar System exploration will achieve a decade from now, when the first samples of Mars material will be sealed in a special capsule and returned to Earth for analysis.

What is the next best thing to humans landing on Mars and exploring the wonders of the Red Planet? The answer: touching, imaging and analysing carefully preserved samples of Martian rock in a state-of-the-art laboratory on Earth. If all goes according to plan, this is exactly what ESA’s long-term Aurora Programme of solar system exploration will achieve a decade from now, when the first samples of Mars material will be sealed in a special capsule and returned to Earth for analysis.

NASA is formulating a Mars exploration plan for the next decade, receiving advice from all quarters, from outside academic circles to internal NASA working groups, as well as from the White House. And if all goes according to plan, Mars will speak for itself, giving up surface and subsurface secrets as ever-more capable spacecraft -- like the two rovers currently en route -- survey that mysterious world. How to respond to the expected fast-paced rush of new discoveries, enough so that outgoing missions can take advantage of just-in findings, is a challenge.

A unique probe, which Russian scientists have designed for studying Phobos [a Mars moon], will be launched in 2009, a representative of the Babakin Center Viktor Kudryashov told Interfax on Monday. "It is a priority of the Russian federal space program. The probe will be launched aboard a Soyuz medium-class rocket from Baikonur," he said. The mission's aim is to gather Phobos ground samples which will then be returned to Earth for analysis, Kudryashov said.

When diseases like SARS, Mad Cow Disease and Monkeypox cross the species barrier and infect humans, they dominate news headlines. Just imagine, then, the reaction if potentially infectious pathogens were found in rock samples from Mars. As we look toward exploring other worlds, and perhaps even bringing samples back to Earth for testing, astrobiologists have to wonder: could alien pathogens cross the "planet" barrier and wreak havoc on our world?

NASA has prepared a draft protocol for the testing and evaluation of samples that may be returned from Mars by future missions in its Mars exploration program. This protocol is designed to provide a model method whereby such samples can be tested for possible biohazards that could be present if life exists on Mars. The protocol has been prepared as a draft to guide the development of both a final protocol to accomplish biohazard and life-detection testing, and to aid in the eventual design of the facility or facilities that will be required to accomplish that testing. Public comment on this draft protocol is sought to provide for refinement of the draft and to provide information for future NASA planning efforts.

Russia's space agency could retrieve the first soil sample from a Mars moon within five years, two of its scientists said. Valery Timofeev, first deputy of the designer-general at the Lavochkin Association, said funding would determine how quickly the goal could be achieved. "At the moment we have finished the preliminary project and the Russian Science Academy is searching for money," he said during a visit to Melbourne.

In many ways, you can get to Mars without stuffing yourself into a spacecraft. Earth's big backyard is full of deserts, glaciers, acid pools, and volcanoes that offer tantalizing clues as to the red planet's past and present. Researchers are trudging to far-flung and desolate spots on Earth, attempting to discern more about Mars. However, drawing out the truth about that distant world from Earth analogs can be tricky. For one, Mars comes replete with less gravity than Earth. Then there's the lower atmospheric pressure. It's a cold, dry place to boot. In many places, layers of dust disguise the true face of Mars.

Step by step, the European Space Agency’s new Aurora space exploration programme is beginning to take shape. This ambitious programme, started by ESA in January 2002, sets out a strategy over the next 30 years for Europe’s robotic and human exploration of Mars, the Moon, and even beyond to the asteroids. On Monday 7 October, the Aurora Board of Participants met at ESA Headquarters in Paris and approved the start of assessment studies for the first four robotic missions in the programme.

In my previous article, I talked about the likely changes in NASA's official "Mars Exploration Program" through 2009 made necessary by the fact that Italy now seems likely to pull out of its collaboration with us and that France may also do so. But the imminent changes in the post-2009 U.S. Mars program are much greater -- and they've been brewing for the past year.

Russian space engineers have begun the construction of a space probe which will be sent to Phobos, one of the Moons surrounding the Planet Mars, in 2007. The engineers, working for the specialist company Lavotchkin, have finished the building of a model in Kaluga, south of Moscow, for a probe which will be sent to Phobos.

A Russian company plans to send a robot probe to a Martian moon in 2007, where it will take a small sample of soil and bring it back to Earth for analysis, the news agency Itar-Tass said Tuesday. The firm, Lavochkin, has made a mock-up of the probe and carried out a number of tests on it at a site at Kaluga, south of Moscow, it said, quoting Sergei Potekhin, director of OKB Kaluga, a firm that is also working on the scheme. If all goes well, the probe would head for Phobos, one of Mars' two moons, in 2007 and scrape up around 100 grammes (three ounces) of soil which it would then bring back to Earth, the report said.

France has reaffirmed its intent to pursue strong new Mars mission cooperation with NASA, while Russia is also seeking new Mars collaboration with the U.S. The French affirmation means that a formal memorandum of understanding (MOU) on the collaboration--which has been awaiting completion at the U.S. State Dept.--will now proceed, said Ed Weiler, NASA associate administrator for space science. French national space agency Director General Gerard Brachet and CNES President Alain Bensoussan met in Washington late last month to discuss the Mars initiative and other cooperation with Weiler and NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe.

The prospect of bringing home Martian soil and small rocks - the whole sample not weighing more than a half-sack of flour - puts a gleam in scientists' eyes. Martian meteorites found on Earth, surface scrutiny from the sky and up-close eyeballing by rovers give clues about the Red Planet's evolution. But scientists say there's nothing quite like getting their hands on samples collected from a few choice locations. "A sample return is so fundamentally important for improving our understanding of Mars," said Bruce Jakosky, a University of Colorado planetary scientist. "It is truly the next step for understanding possible life, history of the atmosphere, the surface and the interior."

The robotic reach to the Red Planet includes grabbing, bagging and then shipping Martian soil and rocks back to Earth. But bringing home the goods, Mars style, is neither easy nor cheap to do. In terms of engineering difficulty, some officials call it "Apollo without astronauts." For years, NASA has wrestled with numerous cash and carry concepts to return chunks of the extraterrestrial terra firma, enough material so electron-microscope peering scientists can get a hands-on feel for Mars. Scrutiny of those bits and pieces may well reveal a message of life. Whether it’s old news or a fresh communique from the Sun’s fourth planet is part of the allure.

The public affairs offices of both NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory confirmed today that the agency is likely to follow a course of action whose possibility was suggested several weeks ago in 'Space Daily': delaying by two years the planned 2007 first test flight of the complex Mars landing spacecraft that will later be used to return Mars samples to Earth.

SpaceDev (OTC Bulletin Board: SPDV), the world's first publicly traded commercial space exploration and development company, announced that it has been awarded a subcontract by Boeing (NYSE: BA) Space & Communications to participate in the Mars Ascent Vehicle Concept Study for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif. Boeing Space & Communications was awarded one of three contracts from JPL to develop concepts for a small rocket that will lift science samples gathered by NASA's Mars Sample Return mission and support their return to Earth. SpaceDev is one of two companies selected by Boeing Space & Communications to participate in the Concept Study.

NASA's Mars Technology Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Califfornia, has awarded three industry contracts for the development of concepts for a small rocket that will lift science samples gathered by NASA's Mars Sample Return mission from the Martian surface and support their return to Earth. A panel consisting of propulsion experts including NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center and JPL selected these companies from the five that responded to the request for proposals. The awardees are: - Boeing Company, Huntington Beach, California - Lockheed Martin Corporation, Denver, Colorado - TRW, Redondo Beach, California

In the wake of the latest report on preparing for samples from Mars, the old arguments for and against have again taken center stage in this perennial debate. The basic argument against returning Mars samples is that the chances that "extant" (that is, still-living) microbes still exist on Mars are higher than NASA is making out, and that there is a genuine and serious chance that such microbes might prove harmful to Earth's biosphere -- and perhaps to human beings themselves. How accurate is this?

Martian rock samples returned to Earth via future spacecraft must be quarantined to protect our planet from hazardous organisms that could hitch a ride here, according to a new report from the National Academies' National Research Council (NRC).

Rocks and soil brought back to Earth from Mars by a future space mission should be handled as if they were chock full of deadly microbes, even though they will almost certainly prove lifeless, a panel of experts said yesterday.

Work on a quarantine facility must begin soon if it is to be ready in time for spacecraft returning to Earth with martian rocks and soil in tow, says a new report from the National Academies' National Research Council.

SpaceDev Inc., the world's first publicly-traded commercial space exploration and development company, today announced that it received over $1 million in new business during April. The new SpaceDev business consists of an increase in the contract value of its CHIPSat micro-satellite, being built for UC Berkeley as part of NASA's first University Explorer program -- NASA's smallest and least expensive earth-orbiting mission; a contract with Boeing to provide NASA's JPL with a variety of Mars Sample Return mission architectures; a contract to support a Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mission proposal; and two CSTA grants concerning the provision of affordable launches for micro-sats and for space-related education.

SpaceDev, Inc., the world's first publicly-traded commercial space exploration and development company, today announced that it is part of a Boeing-led team that was awarded one of four $1 million contracts from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. to study options for a potential Mars sample return mission in 2011. The contract runs from April through October.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration said it has hired four leading aerospace companies to brainstorm about the best way to launch a probe to Mars and guide it back to Earth carrying the first soil samples ever taken from another planet.

NASA's Mars Exploration Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., has awarded four industry team contracts to conduct initial studies of specific implementation scenarios for a first Mars sample return mission that might be launched as early as 2011. The contracts are valued at $1 million each and are to be performed over a six-month period. These studies will formulate a broad suite of potential solutions to robotically acquiring rock and soil samples from Mars. NASA will select the best solutions for further development.

British scientists may be the first to dig up a piece of Mars rock and return it to Earth, under a new proposal that could leapfrog them ahead of NASA in the race to find signs of life at Mars. The mission, which could launch in 2009 if approved by the European Space Agency (ESA), is designed to cost well under the $1 billion that NASA had allotted for a similar mission that presently is on indefinite hold.

British space scientists are proposing an ambitious project to send an unmanned probe to Mars and return with a piece of the planet. The mission would pave the way for the most detailed research yet into the history of Mars and whether it was once home to life. If the proposals get the backing of the European Space Agency, the team will bring the first freshly-mined Martian rock to Earth years before Nasa.

The head of NASA’s Mars exploration program said the agency still must overcome a host of technical challenges before launching its first sample-return mission in 2011. NASA had planned to launch its first Mars sample-return mission in 2005. But back-to-back losses of the Mars Climate Orbiter and Mars Polar Lander in 1999 prompted the agency to pause and rethink its plans for exploring the Red Planet. Even with an extra six years to get ready for the first sample-gathering mission, NASA officials say they have no time to waste.

France, Italy and several other European countries are angling to play an important part in the sample return missions, and the demonstration flight that will precede them, in line with their growing participation in Martian exploration. Under a statement of intent (SOI) signed in October, French national space agency CNES will provide two orbital vehicles--one for a demonstration mission in 2007, the other for the first Mars Sample Return (MSR) flight; a network of four Netlander probes to accompany the 2007 mission; and the launch for the 2007 mission ( AW&ST Nov. 13, p. 99). The Netlanders will also involve the collaboration of German aerospace center DLR, the Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI) and SSTC of Belgium. A final memorandum of understanding (MOU) is to be concluded late next year.

NASA has put all of its Mars sample return (MSR) mission options back on the table and plans to conduct an extensive engineering analysis over the next 1.5 years to select the best combination of new technology and operational techniques. The space agency's goal is to make those decisions in time for a validation mission during the 2007 launch opportunity. And if all works according to plan, the systems and operations used during the 2007 mission would be mirrored in a sample return mission expectedas early as 2011.

Should NASA bring back Mars soil or rock to Earth? While the space agency hopes to accomplish that feat within the decade, the International Committee Against Mars Sample Return (ICAMSR) warns it could infect Earth with an interplanetary plague. NASA unveiled in October a wish list of unmanned missions to Mars in the early 21st century, culminating in several roundtrip flights that would bring home multi-kilogram chunks of the red planet. Terrestrial scientists would poke and prod the samples for evidence of past or present microbial life.

It's like bringing home the bacon, Martian style. For decades, high on NASA's wish list has been rocketing back to Earth clumps of Mars soil and rock via robot spacecraft. One big problem: any NASA U-Haul plan for Mars sample return is expensive. More than a decade ago, space agency engineers blueprinted such a Red Planet project. That scheme went nowhere fast after its price tag of some $5 billion produced sticker shock. More recently, experts at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, scripted a $1.5 billion international undertaking for 2003 and 2005. It involved France and Italy, special rovers, landers and a Mars orbiter that lobs back to Earth two beer-can-sized containers of Martian turf.

A robot spacecraft flies off to another planet, scoops up some soil and brings it back to Earth. Inside that scoop of dirt are living things that somehow escape, run amok and threaten our world. The scenario might sound outlandish until you consider this: For the first time since the 1960's Apollo moon landings, the federal government is making plans to protect Earth from any extraterrestrial life forms brought back -- on purpose -- by scientific space missions.

Debates over the best mission architecture for Apollo were intensive, and often quite heated. Fortunately, an appropriate solution for the time, budget and technology of the program was selected. Intensive planning paid off in a successful program. Today, a similar debate is taking place over a longer time scale with regard to Mars Sample Return. There is no precise timeline for the mission, and no exact budget for it either. However, NASA is still interested in carrying out the project, despite its recent troubles in reaching Mars.

Mars exploration has turned out to be much more difficult than NASA had optimistically hoped in the wake of Pathfinder's stunning success in 1997. Since then the failure of the two 1998 Mars Surveyors has changed everything. But even with these equally stunning failures, the program was headed for a radical revision, as over the past year it's become clear that NASA's hopes to return the first samples from Mars in 2008 for a total cost of about $400 million were wildly optimistic.

NASA’s plans to return samples of soil and rock from Mars could cost at least $1.5 billion and dominate the agency’s agenda for the Red Planet for nearly a decade, virtually precluding all other martian exploratory missions during that time, a top Mars scientist said.

If you imagined each planet, moon, comet, and asteroid to be an isolated and unique test tube, you would understand why a growing number of people are upset about NASA’s sample return plans. Researchers, environmentalists and policymakers want NASA to consider carefully its plans to visit and bring back samples from Mars, Europa, and other solar system bodies.

Because we do not know what deadly microorganisms might be lurking inside samples returned from Mars, the samples will either have to be sterilized before release or kept in isolation until biological studies declare them safe. One way to execute microorganisms is with radiation, such as gamma rays. Although quite effective in snuffing out bacteria and viruses, gamma rays might also affect the mineralogical, chemical, and isotopic compositions of the zapped rocks and soils. Carl Allen (Lockheed Martin Space Operations, Houston) and a team of 18 other analysts tested the effect of gamma rays on rock and mineral samples like those we expect on Mars. Except for some darkening of some minerals, high doses of gamma rays had no significant effect on the rocks, making gamma radiation a feasible option for sterilizing samples returned from Mars.

In part two of Bruce Moomaw's perspective on the possible danger of a Mars Sample Return, he cites almost as fact, that microbe infested meteorites from Mars have been showering the Earth for millions of years, and that because of this, all Earth life has already been "inoculated" against it.

Experts from Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES), the French space agency along with a team from the European Space Agency (ESA) were invited by NASA to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory to observe the Mars Polar Lander's touchdown last week. As Europe prepares for its upcoming Mars missions -- scheduled for 2003 and 2005 -- the French and their European counterparts were keeping a close eye on the proceedings.

At 6 feet tall, the rocket will be shorter than your average NBA player. And it has to hoist only about 9 pounds of cargo into space. But this vehicle is giving Kennedy Space Center engineers a challenge and a chance to extend their launch expertise into the solar system by developing a rocket to blast off from Mars.

A new era is about to begin in space exploration: an era in which samples of material from worlds more distant than the Moon are returned to Earth by unmanned spacecraft.

When the Mars Sample Return mission faces the chore of collecting rock cores to bring back to Earth, sometime during 2004, the whole mission will be standing on the head of a pin, Stephen Gorevan likes to say.

Quarantines can help a society protect itself from dangerous infections. The word comes from the French, for the 40 days of isolation once faced by new arrivals who may have been infected. After the quarantine has passed, they were either certified to be disease-free — or dead.

The Texas medical school planning a laboratory to handle the world’s most dangerous organisms is ready to take on the universe. The University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, 45 miles south of Houston, is discussing the possibility of housing any Mars specimens returned to Earth in NASA’s proposed unmanned missions to the Red Planet next decade.

NASA's latest plan to seek signs of life on Mars revives a 40-year-old rocket that would vault Martian rock samples into space for an eventual ride to Earth - the first time pieces of any planet will have landed here.

NASA’s latest plan to seek signs of life on Mars revives a 40-year-old rocket that would vault Martian rock samples into space for an eventual ride to Earth — the first time pieces of any planet will have been carried back on a spacecraft.