China has moved up the launch of its Tianwen 3 mission to bring Mars samples back to Earth to 2028. The new schedule, two years earlier than originally planned, suggests China could bring Mars samples back to Earth as early as 2031.
Speaking at the second International Deep Space Exploration Conference (also known as the Tiandu Forum) in China's Anhui province last week, Liu Jizhong, the chief designer of the Tianwen 3 mission, said the effort will consist of Two rocket launches One will carry a lander and a two-stage ascent vehicle, and the other an orbiter and a craft returning to Earth.
Tianwen 3, which aims to use a lander-based drill to collect at least 500 grams (17.6 ounces) of surface samples that could reveal clues about Life on Mars and the evolution of the planet's climate, could also include a foldable autonomous helicopter similar to Agency's Witas well as a six-legged robot to collect samples far from the landing site, Space.com previously reported.
“There is now a real possibility that China could return Martian samples before the United States,” said Quentin Parker, an astrophysicist at the University of Hong Kong. Malaysian Posta Malaysian online newspaper.
Related: China may add helicopter and six-legged robot to Mars sample return mission
Liu did not specify when Mars The samples could be returned to Earth, but officials previously noted that the round-trip mission would take about three years, suggesting the Red Planet rocks could return to Earth around 2031 if the mission launches in 2028 as now planned. Ars Technica reported.
China's updated schedule suggests that samples could be returned to Earth well before the joint Agency-European Space Agency Mars Sample Return (MSR) program does. That effort is getting a boost major review After costs and schedules significantly exceeded the original mission timeline, Agency Administrator Bill Nelson was left in limbo. has said The $11 billion cost of the MSR campaign is too expensive, too complex, and “not returning samples until 2040 is unacceptably too long.”
In June, Agency Awarded contracts worth 1.5 million dollars to seven companies including SpaceX, Blue Origin, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman for their ideas on a simpler, less expensive and less risky alternative to the troubled existing structure.
Meanwhile, scientists continue to highlight the scientific value of bringing home the MSR samples, which have already been collected by Agency. The Perseverance roverThe samples, which contain fine- and coarse-grained sandstone and shale sediments, could reveal crucial clues about the chemistry of the water that deposited them billions of years ago and, perhaps, Evidence of past microbial life on Marsif it ever existed.
Answers to these decades-old mysteries could reach Earth as early as 2031, if all goes well with China's accelerated mission plan.
“It's not just a race,” astronomer Jonathan McDowell told Malay Mail. “It's a high scientific priority to understand Mars and our solar system.”