An exciting series of missions are set to head to Mars over
the next two decades (Credit: NASA)
There are currently a record seven active unmanned missions
operating on or around Mars, but the parade has only just begun.
The next few years will be very busy indeed as a new series of
international missions head out to the Red Planet, possibly
culminating in the first manned landing or even colonization
before 2030. Let's have a look at the program.
At the moment, there are seven active Mars missions with one
more scheduled to arrive in October 2016. Operated by NASA, ESA,
and India's ISRO, six of these are orbiters and two are rovers.
That may seem excessive for a planet that makes the Atacama
desert look like a garden, but Mars is of great interest to
scientists because of its potential for telling us more about
the Earth's climate, the origins of the inner planets, and
whether life arose in more than one place in the Solar System.
Not to mention that getting a spacecraft successfully to Mars
wins major points for any spacefaring nation (or
business enterprise).
Planned and enroute
Like the current batch, the planned missions and those
already on the way are a mixed bag. There are about seven of
them scheduled to arrive at Mars after 2020, with "about" being
the operative word because budgets and national priorities can
change very quickly. These missions are, for the most part,
extensions and more focused versions of the current ones, aiming
to learn more about the geology and atmosphere of the planet,
and seeking evidence to answer the question of whether Mars ever
harbored life.
ExoMars 2016
The first of these missions is already more than halfway
there.
Exobiology Mars (ExoMars) 2016 is a joint ESA/Roscosmos
mission in two parts that is tasked with looking for evidence of
life on Mars. The first is the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), which
will look for traces of methane in the Martian atmosphere with
an eye on learning more about the mechanism that produces it and
to determine if this is geological, chemical, or biological. It
will also send back images of the Martian surface and search for
subsurface ice deposits.
The second is the Schiaparelli entry, descent, and landing
demonstrator module, which is currently docked with the TGO.
It's much simpler spacecraft that will be released three days
before the TGO arrives in Mars orbit on October 19, 2016. As the
TGO goes into an elliptical orbit about the planet, the
Schiaparelli module's brief career will entail taking readings
of the atmosphere during its descent to the surface. Though it's
not a lander, it will test landing radar, navigational cameras,
and other instruments that will be used for the ExoMars 2020
lander mission. If it survives the descent, the probe will not
be able to send back pictures from the surface, but it will
continue to send back telemetry for as long as its batteries
hold out.
InSight
The next NASA mission is the InSight lander, which is
scheduled to lift off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in
California on May 5, 2018 (a faulty vacuum seal in one of the
primary instruments meant it missed the 2016 launch window). The
InSight stationary lander is based on NASA's
Phoenix lander, which set down at the Martian North Pole in
2008, and is designed for a 720-day primary mission near the
Martian equator.
Insight's primary mission is to study the interior of Mars to
learn more about is evolution – especially in regard to the
density and structure of its core, mantle, and crust. To do
this, it will use robotic arm for placing instruments, including
hammering a heat-flow meter up to 15 ft (4.5 m) into the ground.
This will be the deepest drilling operation ever carried out on
Mars.
Mars 2020
Mars 2020 is the temporary name for NASA's next Mars rover
mission. Its primary objective is to visit areas that could once
have been habitable and collect and analyze soil and rock
samples for chemical signs of past life. Some of these samples
will be stored for recovery and return to Earth by a future
mission, and the rover will study the present Martian
environment to gage the suitability for supporting a future
manned mission.
The design of the rover is based heavily on
Curiosity with the same chassis and undercarriage as
Curiosity, Like Curiosity, it will also use a plutonium-fueled
nuclear radiothermal generator as a power source, and it will
sport a similar arm and camera mast, but it will also include a
new suite of
seven scientific instruments developed by US and
international partners.
ExoMars 2020
ExoMars 2020 started out as
ExoMars 2018, but the follow-on mission for
ExoMars 2016 was delayed due to various schedule overruns.
Its purpose is to act as an example of Russo-European
cooperation as well as a technology demonstrator by landing a
rover in the equatorial region of Mars.
Now scheduled to lift off in July 2020, the second ExoMars
mission will have a Russian-built landing platform carrying a
European-built rover. The landing platform will carry out
studies of the Martian atmosphere, radiation, and signs of
water. Meanwhile, the rover will hunt for organic molecules and
biosignatures, and study the geology using subsurface radar.
Mangalyaan 2
The last three planned missions are a bit hazier because they
are still in the planning stages. One of these is the Indian
Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) Mangalyaan 2 probe, which
is a follow up to its successful
Mars Orbiter Mission (also known as Mangalyaan 1) that
reached the Red Planet in 2014. Aimed to launch in 2020, its
current design is to include an orbiter, lander, and rover,
which will be built in partnership with France's Centre National
d'Etudes Spatiale.
Artist's concept of of India's Mars orbiter Mission,
which is the basis for Mangalyaan 2
2020 Chinese Mars Mission
Another one on the drawing board is the
2020 Chinese Mars Mission. According to Chinese state media,
it will be launched atop a Long March 5 rocket in July or August
2020 and will include an orbiter, lander, and rover – the
designs for which were
recently unveiled. In addition, it will act as a technology
demonstrator for a sample return mission in the 2030s.
Emirates Mars Mission
Then there is the
Emirates Mars Mission, also known as the Hope Mars Mission.
Also planned for 2020, it will be a hexagonal, solar-powered
orbiter built by the United Arab Emirates and will study the
Martian atmosphere.
Proposed missions
Along with the planned missions, there are more that are
little more than proposals, challenge entrants, and
back-of-the-envelope ideas that may never get funding. The more
serious and likely to go ahead include a sample return mission
by NASA or other space agencies to retrieve the samples
collected by the Mars 2020 mission and return them to Earth.
Though no details have been approved,
NASA has put forward a plan to use rover to pick up the
sample cases and transfer them to a lander with an ascent
vehicle aboard to send the samples into Mars orbit. There it
would rendezvous with a solar-electric spacecraft, which would
return to Earth with its cargo for examination.
Mars 2020 will gather samples for retrieval by a
later mission
Other proposed missions include a joint mission by Finland,
Russia, and Spain called
Mars MetNet to study the Martian weather; Japan's
MELOS rover for Martian geology, meteorology, and
exobiology, which might include a drone aircraft; NASA's
Icebreaker Life, which is a near copy of the Phoenix lander
for looking for signs of life on the Martian plains during the
local summer; the
Phobos And Deimos & Mars Environment (PADME) to survey the
Martian moons; ESA's
Phootprint, which would return samples from Phobos; and
BOLD, which is intended to follow up on the original Viking
biology experiments.
Manned missions
What really piques public interest in Mars exploration is the
possibility that an astronaut may one day setting foot on the
red sands of the planet's dead sea bottoms. Proposals for
missions to Mars go back to Wernher Von Braun's
The Mars Project in 1953, where he made a detailed plan for
a fleet of ten spaceships carrying a crew of 70 that would be
assembled in Earth orbit before setting off for Mars in 1965.
Since then, there have been countless proposals for missions
to Mars. Some planned to use nuclear-powered rocket engines,
others were jumped-up versions of Apollo hardware, and some were
so minimal that it would have been like crossing the Atlantic in
a dinghy. There were rotating ships to create artificial
gravity, electric drive ships that accelerated at a snail's pace
to build up tremendous velocities, and some that used
complicated orbits to ferry back and forth from Mars to Earth.
Journey to Mars
Today, though every major spacefaring nation expresses
interest in sending humans to Mars, the serious contenders are
NASA and private companies. The US space agency even talks about
its
"Journey to Mars" on a regular basis and has set a goal to
send a manned mission in the 2030s, but the phrase is still a
slogan rather than an official program.
If it does receive funding, the current plan is to hitch the
Orion spacecraft to an inflatable habitat to provide the
crew with more room for the 16-month journey. Unfortunately, the
Space Launch System (SLS) is still under development and the
Orion has suffered a number of
setbacks, so when and if are still large questions.
Mars One
A more ambitious project is
Mars One. It's privately-funded venture that plans to not
only to send an astronaut to Mars, but to colonize it by 2025
with permanent settlers sent on a one-way mission with no chance
of return. The idea is that robot landers will seek out a
suitable spot for the outpost, then be followed by a series of
unmanned cargo landers to supply robots that would build the
habitats and support structures. Once everything is set up, the
first four colonists would be sent with four more to follow
every four years.
The project is supposed to be funded by a reality television
series, and it has received a great deal of publicity since it
announced in 2012, but the television deal fell through,
questions were raised about the technology proposed and the
colonist selection process. And then there's the fact that with
less than nine years until the first person is set to leave,
none of the required hardware has been sorted out.
SpaceX
SpaceX founder Elon Musk has made no bones about wanting to
go to Mars – and he means personally. Plans for an
unmanned landing in 2018 using a Red Dragon capsule were
announced in 2016 and in an interview with the
Washington Post the tech entrepreneur gave a broad
outline of a proposal that could see a manned mission touching
down on the Red Planet in 2025.
The proposed 2018 landing would be the start of an intense
program of sending ships to Mars every two years as Earth and
Mars come into opposition. The landings would culminate in a
manned mission touching down in 2025 using the Mars Colonial
Transporter, which is scheduled to first fly in 2022 and is
designed to not only carry explorers, but, as it says on the
tin, colonists one day.
So the next decade or two on Mars looks very busy, with all
manner of robotic probes on their way. This cyber-armada will
provide new insights into the nature and history of the Red
Planet and may even tell us if it ever was home to life. We may
also see the dream of science fiction writers and just plain
dreamers come true as the first footprints are made and the
first flags planted in the rusty sands. Perhaps future robotic
probes sent to Mars will need to be equipped with "please don't
touch" signs for the benefit of inquisitive settlers.
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