The Canada Brief

Tech · 18 d ago

Phobos, the larger moon of Mars

Japan is set to launch a mission to bring back soil from Mars's moon Phobos

Oct

19

Monday

Tanegashima Space Center, Japan

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency plans to launch the Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) spacecraft on an H3 rocket from Tanegashima Space Center on Monday at 3:41 p.m. ET.

The mission's plan

  1. August 2027

    Arrives at Mars

  2. Early 2029

    Drops the IDEFIX rover on Phobos

  3. 2030

    Lands to collect at least 10 grams of soil

  4. 2031

    Sample capsule lands in Australia

MMX should reach Mars in August 2027, drop a small French-German rover called IDEFIX on Phobos in early 2029, land to collect at least 10 grams of soil in 2030 and return it to Australia in 2031.

Theory one

Captured asteroids

Theory two

Debris from an impact

Scientists still debate whether Phobos and its sibling Deimos are captured asteroids or debris from a large impact on Mars. The samples should settle it.

Background

No mission has yet landed on Phobos and returned a sample: two Soviet probes were lost in 1988 and 1989, and Russia's Phobos-Grunt never left Earth orbit in 2011.