 | Today's News 2012 NASA Announces to Launch Another Mars Rover in 2020 Messenger probe More This Week Today's News 2012 NASA Announces to Launch Another Mars Rover in 2020 Messenger probe More This Week NASA plans to send a new rover laboratory to Mars in 2020. The space agency said Tuesday that the spacecraft will be built from spare parts from Curiosity. Curiosity, their latest 1-ton rover, just begun a two-year mission in August. This new $1.5-billion mission would bring the total number of current or planned missions on Mars to seven. In addition to Curiosity and Opportunity, the two rovers currently on Mars, NASA has two spacecraft in orbit around our planetary neighbor: Mars Odyssey and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. Next year, NASA is set to launch the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN satellite, or Maven, to study the Martian atmosphere. And just a few months ago, the space agency gave the green light to a mission called Interior exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, or InSight, which will launch in 2016 to study the interior of Mars. NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a statement that the new mission ensures that the United States "remains the world leader" in Mars exploration. Scientists haven't hashed out exactly what the new rover would try to accomplish on Mars, but it may collect samples of rock and soil from the Martian surface that could be returned to Earth for study. Scooping up samples from Mars and sending them safely back to Earth is a long-term goal for NASA, said Steven Squyres, chairman of the NASA <b>...</b> | Views: 154  2 ratings |
| Time: 01:10 | More in News & Politics |
Today's News 2012 NASA Announces to Launch Another Mars Rover in 2020 Messenger probe More This Week
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