Rationale and Proposed Design for a Mars Sample Return (MSR) Science Program

Timothy Haltigin* (Corresponding Author), Ernst Hauber, Gerhard Kminek* (Corresponding Author), Michael A Meyer* (Corresponding Author), Carl B. Agee, Henner Busemann, Brandi Lee Carrier* (Corresponding Author), Daniel P. Glavin, Lindsay E Hays, Bernard Marty, Lisa M Pratt, Arya Udry, Maria-Paz Zorzano, David W Beaty* (Corresponding Author), Barbara Cavalazzi, Charles S. Cockell, Vinciane Debaille, Monica M. Grady, Aurore Hutzler, Francis M. McCubbinAaron B. Regberg, Alvin L Smith, Caroline L Smith, Roger E. Summons, Timothy D Swindle, Kimberly T Tait, Nicholas J. Tosca, Tomohiro Usui, Michael A. Velbel, Meenakshi Wadhwa, Frances Westall

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    12 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    The Mars Sample Return (MSR) Campaign represents one of the most ambitious scientific endeavors ever undertaken. Analyses of the martian samples would offer unique science benefits that cannot be attained through orbital or landed missions that rely only on remote sensing and in situ measurements, respectively. As currently designed, the MSR Campaign comprises a number of scientific, technical, and programmatic bodies and relationships, captured in a series of existing and anticipated documents. Ensuring that all required scientific activities are properly designed, managed, and executed would require significant planning and coordination. Because there are multiple scientific elements that would need to be executed to achieve MSR Campaign success, it is critical to ensure that the appropriate management, oversight, planning, and resources are made available to accomplish them. This could be achieved via a formal MSR Science Management Plan (SMP). A subset of the MSR Science Planning Group 2 (MSPG2)?termed the SMP Focus Group?was tasked to develop inputs for an MSR Campaign SMP. The scope is intended to cover the interface to the Mars 2020 mission, science elements in the MSR flight program, ground-based science infrastructure, MSR science opportunities, and the MSR sample and science data management. In this report, a comprehensive MSR Science Program is proposed that comprises specific science bodies and/or activities that could be implemented to address the science functionalities throughout the MSR Campaign. The proposed structure was designed by taking into consideration previous management review processes, a set of guiding principles, and key lessons learned from previous robotic exploration and sample return missions.
    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)s27-s56
    Number of pages30
    JournalAstrobiology
    Volume22
    Issue numberS1
    Early online date19 May 2022
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2 Jun 2022

    Bibliographical note

    Acknowledgments
    The decision to implement Mars Sample Return will not be finalized until NASA’s
    completion of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process. This document is being made available for planning and information purposes only.
    Funding Information
    A portion of this work was funded by the National Aeronautics and Space
    Administration (NASA), the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). A portion of this work was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (80NM0018D0004).
    This work has partly (H. B.) been carried out within the framework of the NCCR PlanetS supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation. M.A.V.’s participation in MSPG2 was supported in part by a sabbatical leave-of-absence from Michigan State University. M.-P.Z. was supported by projects PID2019-104205GB-C21 of Ministry of Science and Innovation and MDM-2017-0737 Unidad de Excelencia ‘Maria de Maeztu’- Centro de Astrobiología (CSIC-INTA) (Spain). A portion of this work was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (80NM0018D0004). The decision to implement Mars Sample Return will not be finalized until NASA’s completion of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) process. This document is being made available for planning and information purposes only.

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