NASA Is Asking for Help to Return Samples That Could Uncover Life on Mars

The Mars Sample Return program is a joint NASA-ESA effort, with the goal of uncovering signs of ancient life on the Red Planet.

Jack Daleo

Monday, April 15, 2024 at 05:05 PM ET

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An artist’s illustration depicts the vehicles NASA initially planned to use to recover samples from its Perseverance Martian rover. [Courtesy: NASA]

Key Takeaways:

NASA's Mars Sample Return (MSR) program faces significant challenges, with an independent review estimating costs at an "unacceptable" $8-11 billion and a return date of 2040.
Administrator Bill Nelson has announced a "revised path forward," urging the NASA community and industry to propose "out-of-the-box" designs that reduce costs, complexity, and leverage existing technology for a sample return in the 2030s.
The agency warns that if more affordable solutions aren't found, the MSR program's high costs could divert funding from other critical science missions.

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NASA Administrator Bill Nelson has shared the space agency’s “revised path forward” for the Mars Sample Return program, a proposed NASA-European Space Agency (ESA) mission to return Martian rock and soil samples to Earth. NASA’s Perseverance rover has been collecting rock and soil samples on the Red Planet since 2021.

The agency is asking “the NASA community,” including its Jet Propulsion Laboratory and other agency centers, to collaborate on “out-of-the-box” designs, using existing technology, that could return the samples.