For astronaut safety and to bolster success of the human exploration to come later, NASA needs an end-to-end demonstration of ...

Plans are firming up to bring a sample of Mars back to Earth in 2031. A joint webinar last month by NASA and Lockheed Martin, which has participated in NASA sample return missions before, l went over ...

The samples could change what we know about the origins of the solar system. A seven-year-long NASA mission has come to an end with the first asteroid sample collected in space. This capsule, the size ...

China plans to launch two heavy-lift Long March 5 rockets with elements of the Tianwen-3 Mars sample return mission in 2028, the mission’s chief designer said Thursday. In a presentation at a Chinese ...

U.S. plans to return Mars samples face delays as China advances its own mission. Scientists and policymakers debate costs, timelines, and the role of sample return in future Mars exploration ...

HELSINKI — China has unveiled a long-term roadmap to guide its space science programs up to 2050, including a mission to collect a sample of the Venusian atmosphere. The Chinese Academy of Sciences ...

WASHINGTON, Oct 23 (Reuters) - NASA and Chinese officials are engaged in talks to let American scientists analyze rocks retrieved by China from the moon, according to the head of the U.S. space agency ...

An independent review of NASA’s ambitious mission to return about half a kilogram of rocks and soil from the surface of Mars has found that the program is unworkable in its current form. NASA had been ...

Marvels of engineering, the rover’s sample tubes must be tough enough to safely bring Red Planet samples on the long journey back to Earth in immaculate condition. The tubes carried in the belly of ...