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After multiple delays, the European Space Agency (ESA) has put its Mars all-terrain vehicle project Rosalind Franklin back on track. According to the new plan, the launch will take place in 2028 and the rover will start rolling on the Martian surface in 2030.

Two meters underground

The most ambitious space program currently planned for Mars is a European one called ExoMars. Its main objective is to carry on the Martian surface an all-terrain vehicle named after the eminent chemist and crystallographer Rosalind Franklin. And his greatest interest lies in the drill that is incorporated and that will be able to drill the surface of Mars to a depth of 2 meters. There is no other rover, neither of those already on the surface of the red planet, nor of those projected, that is capable of doing something like this.

Location of Oxia Planum on MarsNASA

Collecting samples from the subsurface at such depths is what is considered today the most promising experiment to discover signs of life on the red planet, if there ever was one. These samples have been protected from all the inclemencies of Martian weather and radiation. Therefore, they will be representative of the wettest past eras of the planet, when water flowed abundantly on the surface.

The chosen landing site, the Oxia Planum, near the equator, is one of those that preserve remains of those wet times. It is thought that in the subsoil there will be relevant amounts of water, where life -if there was, or if there is- has had to have left its mark. The SUV will also explore all that area and will be equipped with a molecular analyzer to search and characterize, with a very high sensitivity, the organic compounds found there.

Multiple delays

The ExoMars program began on March 14, 2016 with the launch of the TGO (Trace Gas Orbiter) orbiter that incorporates, in addition to four measuring instruments, a communications antenna. This ship is still in operation today. Also on that mission was the Schiaparelli descent module, intended to test descent and landing technologies, but it crashed to the surface due to a software glitch.

The Rosalind Franklin integrated on the Kazachok platform in ItalyESA

The second part of ExoMars consisted of the launch of the Rosalind Franklin vehicle that was initially planned for 2018, but due to the problems encountered in the first part of the program, it was postponed until 2020 (remember that the launch windows to Mars open once every two years). Then the pandemic came and everything was delayed until the fall of 2022.

But the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 came to pose a new and very serious problem. Indeed, Europe and Russia had been collaborating very closely in the mission (the US had been involved in the preparations, very early on, but had withdrawn from the collaboration in 2012). Russia was to provide the Proton rocket for launch, as well as the Kazachok module for the rover's landing on Mars.

When the invasion occurred, the Rosalind Franklin was already integrated with the Kazachok module (currently in Italy) which, in turn, includes multiple components manufactured in Europe, such as the on-board computer, a radar altimeter, etc.

In July 2022, ESA ended its collaboration with the Russian space agency Roscosmos on this and other programmes and was consequently forced to cancel the launch of the Rosalind Franklin. The mission was deadlocked. Naturally, the Kazachok could no longer be used and ESA asked Roscosmos to remove the European components from the module, something that can only be done by the Russian technicians who were responsible for its construction and integration.

New plan

After a time of confusion, the European agency, without means of carrying out the mission alone, began to consider other collaboration options. ESA soon looked again to the US and resumed talks with NASA and have now progressed rapidly. It is hoped that the US agency can provide the means to develop a new lander to replace the Kazachok.

NASA's 2024 budget request includes $30 million for ExoMars, and the two agencies continue to discuss the budget that will be needed in the coming years. Both agencies are also strengthening ties in the MSR (Mars Sample Return) project which, following the American initiative, aims to bring samples from Mars to Earth.

Overall, in the human and robotic exploration programme, which includes ExoMars and MSR, ESA will invest €2.700 billion. ESA's current plan calls for injecting €500 million from this program into ExoMars, so that the Rosalind Franklin will be launched in 2028. Of course, the new lander will have a much simpler design than the Kazachok, it will not carry payload in the form of instruments, its only function will be to leave the rover circulating on the surface of Mars.

ESA scientists say that the new schedule eliminates some risks, since the rover will land on Mars in the spring of the northern hemisphere, thus having good lighting for the solar panels and without the danger posed by dust storms.

Recent Rosalind Franklin Drill Ground Test | ESAESA

As we can see, the path of Rosalind Franklin is being long and tortuous. First the epidemic and then the war have added to the technological challenges facing all space projects, projects that are among the most complex that humanity conceives today. Hopefully the space agencies will be able to continue to weather all these imponderables and continue to strengthen their collaboration in this type of peaceful missions. The study of Mars, our sister planet, will bring us scientific and technological benefits of enormous value for which it is worth waiting.

Rafael Bachiller is director of the National Astronomical Observatory (Instituto Geográfico Nacional) and academician of the Royal Academy of Doctors of Spain.

  • Astronomy

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