NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) are planning ways to bring the first samples of Mars material back to Earth for detailed study. The Mars Perseverance rover is the first leg of this international interplanetary relay team. Its job is to collect and cache samples on Mars. A Sample Return Lander would land near or in Jezero Crater, bringing a small rocket on which the samples collected by Perseverance would be loaded. Two Ingenuity-like helicopters would provide a secondary capability to retrieve samples on the surface of Mars. Once the sample cache is launched off the Red Planet, another spacecraft would capture it in Mars orbit, and then bring it back to Earth safely and securely in the early to mid 2030s. These first collected and returned samples could answer a key question: did life ever exist on Mars? Only by bringing the samples back can we truly answer the question by using the most sophisticated, state-of-the-art labs, at a time when future generations can study them using techniques yet to be invented.
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A Sample Retrieval Lander would launch to Mars in 2028, carrying with it a NASA-led Mars rocket and a pair of small Mars helicopters. The lander would touch down close to Perseverance's landing location in Jezero Crater.
Lead: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Having collected and stored a wide variety of samples, the Perseverance rover would be the primary means of transporting samples to the Sample Retrieval Lander, handing off a collection of sample tubes carried on board. An ESA-provided robotic arm would transfer the tubes into a sample container on the lander's rocket.
Lead: Jet Propulsion Laboratory + European Space Agency
A pair of helicopters would provide a secondary capability to pick up additional samples stashed on the surface by Perseverance, bringing them back to the lander for transfer onto the Mars rocket.
Lead: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
The Mars Ascent Vehicle would be the first rocket ever to launch off the surface of Mars, transporting the container of sample tubes into orbit.
Lead: Marshall Space Flight Center
The Capture, Containment, and Return System aboard the Earth Return Orbiter would capture the Orbiting Sample container, orient it, and transfer it into a clean zone for return to Earth.
Lead: Goddard Space Flight Center
The ESA Earth Return Orbiter would carry the NASA-provided Capture, Containment, and Return System and Earth Entry System. The orbiter would launch from Earth in 2027 and meet the sample cache in Mars orbit.
The return system within the orbiter would capture and contain the samples, placing them in the Earth Entry System. The Earth Return Orbiter would then ferry the entry vehicle and its precious cargo back to the vicinity of Earth, where it would separate and safely touchdown on land.
Lead: European Space Agency
The Earth Entry System would contain the orbiting sample inside a disk-shaped vehicle with a heat shield for safe entry through the Earth's atmosphere.
Lead: Langley and Ames Research Centers
The first time several vehicles (a lander, a rocket, and multiple helicopters) would land on the surface of Mars at the same time.
First launch from the surface of another planet with the Mars Ascent Vehicle.
First international, interplanetary relay effort using multiple missions to bring back samples from another planet.
The return of the first set of samples to Earth from a place known to be friendly to life in the distant past.
The most carefully selected and well-documented set of samples ever returned from another planet.
Mars 2020
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Helicopter Tech Demo
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MAVEN Orbiter
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