United States, France ink deal on 2016 Mars mission
US, France have signed a 2016 Mars Mission deal to figure out the planet's evolution.
WASHINGTON: The United States and France unveiled plans to collaborate on a new Mars mission, two years after NASA withdrew from a European partnership to send a probe and lander to the Red Planet. The mission will help understand how Mars evolved and will help to learn more about Earth
The project aims to send an unmanned lander to study the deep interior of the dry, dusty planet that is Earth's neighbor, and will be called InSight, short for the Interior Exploration Using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy, and Heat Transport.
The mission is scheduled to launch in March 2016 and would arrive on Mars six months later.
"The research generated by this collaborative mission will give more information about the early formation of Mars, which will help understand more about how Earth evolved," said Bolden.
The lander will send details how Mars formed, and will also probe how tectonic activity and meteorite impacts shaped the Red planet.
Other partners on the project's science instruments include the German Aerospace Center, United Kingdom Space Agency, and the Swiss Space Office.
NASA currently has two rovers actively exploring Mars -- the Curiosity rover, which launched in 2012, and the smaller Opportunity rover, which recently marked its tenth year in operation.