NASA announced Friday that it has signed contracts with seven companies, including SpaceX and Blue Origin, to study cheaper ways to transport Martian rock samples to Earth.
The space agency in April called for proposals from industry for ways to bring Martian rocks back to Earth for under $11 billion, matching the cost and timeline of NASA’s existing Mars Sample Return (MSR) program by 2040. A NASA spokesperson told Ars that the agency received 48 applications in response to the call and selected seven companies for more detailed studies.
Each company will receive up to $1.5 million for 90 days of research. Five of the companies selected by NASA are on the agency’s list of large contractors, making them a natural choice for the research contracts. The other two are small businesses.
Mars sample return is a top priority for NASA’s planetary science division. The Perseverance rover, currently on Mars, is set to collect dozens of samples of rock powder, soil and Martian air in a cigar-shaped titanium tube that will eventually be brought back to Earth.
“Mars Sample Return will be one of the most complex missions NASA has ever undertaken, and it is critical that we do it faster, with less risk and at lower cost,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. “I look forward to seeing the vision these companies, centers and partners bring to the table as we explore fresh, inspiring and innovative ideas to unlock great cosmic secrets from the Red Planet.”
Who’s there?
According to NASA, Lockheed Martin, the only company to have built a spacecraft that has successfully landed on Mars, will conduct an “Expedited Mission Design Study for Mars Sample Return.” Northrop Grumman was also awarded the contract for its proposal for a “High TRL (Technology Readiness Level) MAV (Mars Ascent Vehicle) Propulsion Technology Trade and Conceptual Design for MSR Rapid Mission Design.”
The two companies had partnered to develop a solid-fuel Mars Ascent Vehicle for NASA’s existing Mars Sample Return mission. The MAV is the rocket that will launch a capsule containing rock samples from the Martian surface into space to begin the months-long journey back to Earth. Given Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman’s involvement in NASA’s Mars program, and the scope of research implied in Northrop’s proposal, it seems likely that the companies will propose applying their existing capabilities to the Mars Sample Return program solution.
Aerojet Rocketdyne, best known as a supplier of rocket propulsion equipment, will study an advanced liquid-fueled Mars ascent vehicle using what the company calls “reliable and mature propulsion technologies to improve program economics and schedules.”
SpaceX, a company with a long-term vision for Mars exploration, also received funding for a research contract from NASA. The company’s research proposal was titled “Enabling Mars Sample Return with Starship.” SpaceX is already designing its privately funded Starship rocket with a Mars exploration mission in mind, and company founder Elon Musk predicts that Starship will land on Mars within the next decade.
Musk has famously beaten timeline projections with Starship in the past, and landing on Mars before the end of the 2020s still seems unlikely. But the giant rocket could potentially deliver tens of tons of cargo to Mars and eventually back. Starship’s successful test flight this week proved that SpaceX is making progress toward that goal. Still, there’s a long way to go.
Jeff Bezos’ space company Blue Origin will also receive funding for research it calls “Mars Sample Return via Artemis.”
SpaceX and Blue Origin each have multi-billion-dollar contracts with NASA to develop the Starship and Blue Moon Lander, crewed spacecraft to transport astronauts to the lunar surface as part of the Artemis program.
Two other smaller companies, Quantum Space and Whittinghill Aerospace, will also conduct research for NASA.
Quantum, which describes itself as a space infrastructure company, was founded in 2021 by entrepreneur Kam Ghaffarian, who also founded Intuitive Machines and Axiom Space. Details about the scope of the study, called the “Quantum Anchor Leg Mars Sample Return Study,” are scarce. The “anchor leg” likely refers to the final stage of bringing the samples back to Earth, like the anchor in a relay race.
Whitting Hill Aerospace, a California-based company with just a handful of employees, said it plans to fast-track a study design for a single-stage Mars ascent vehicle, according to NASA.
Not on the list of contract winners is Boeing, which is pushing for use of NASA’s ultra-expensive Space Launch System (SLS) to carry out a Mars sample-return mission in a single launch. Boeing, of course, builds most of the SLS rockets; most other sample-return concepts require multiple launches.
In addition to the seven industry contracts, NASA centers Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) will also conduct research on ways to complete a Mars sample return mission at lower cost.
JPL is the lead center managing NASA’s existing Mars sample return initiative in partnership with the European Space Agency, but rising costs and delays led NASA officials to decide in April to take a different approach.
NASA’s science chief, Nicola Fox, said in April that she hopes “outside the box” concepts will allow the space agency to bring samples back to Earth in the 2030s, rather than after 2040. “It’s certainly a very ambitious goal,” she said. “We need to be very innovative with our design and pursue new possibilities and leave no stone unturned.”
NASA will use the results of these 10 studies to develop a new approach for Mars sample return, scheduled for later this year. In all likelihood, the architecture NASA ultimately chooses will be a combination of elements from industry, NASA centers, and the European Space Agency, which remains a steadfast partner in Mars sample return along with the Earth-return rover.
