Already on the books is a potent flotilla of NASA Mars craft, such as the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for 2005, the Phoenix Mars lander in 2007, and a Mars Science Laboratory rover for 2009.
But thanks to glimpses provided courtesy of both Spirit and Opportunity, Mars never looked better.
Rewrite the text books
The revelations relayed back to Earth by Opportunity have spotlighted future Mars exploration needs for the next decade, said Ed Weiler, NASA head of the Office of Space Science.
"Its clear were going to have to do a sample mission," Weiler said during Tuesdays Mars press briefing at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. Money needs to be also spent on miniaturizing equipment for transport to Mars. Another priority is to land instruments that pave the way for eventual human landings on the red planet, he said.
Gauging the toxicity of martian soil has to be done, Weiler said. Also, how best to use the minerals on Mars for conversion to oxygen, or to power rockets is high on his action item list.
Some future work on Mars may be totally science oriented, Weiler said, some may be totally human preparation oriented. "I have a feeling that all of the missions are going to be a mix of those two things," he said.
Predicting right now what those missions might look like -- other than a sample return next decade -- is dangerous, Weiler said.
"Mars doesnt tend to read our textbooks. It tends to write them for us. And rewrite them every time we send a mission," Weiler concluded.
Complicated planet
Bits of Mars back in the lab are needed, not only to unravel in a lot more detail what the planets geological history has been, but also to address the questions about life.
Thats the view of Bruce Jakosky, professor of geological sciences and Director of the Center for Astrobiology at the University of Colorado, Boulder. "I think that answering the question about life [on Mars] is going to take a sample return," he said.
Mars is a complicated planet, Jakosky said. "I think what were seeing is that things are not globally uniform. There are environments where liquid water does quite welland probably places where there hasnt been any. And we now know that in at least one place its a great environment for life at some time in the past," he said.
Jakosky said that NASA is also evaluating the role of a possible Astrobiology Field Laboratory. That rover would haul science gear tuned specifically to peruse Mars for traces of life.
"Every time we have sent a new spacecraft to Mars, we might have as well sent it to another planetbecause we see its very different from what weve expected. We are not just learning about the same processes in more detail. Each time we send a new spacecraft, a new instrument, or visit a new site, we learn about an entirely unexpected suite or processes," Jakosky told SPACE.com .
Major shot in the arm
The upshot from Opportunitys survey work has rocketed throughout the science community.
The output from Opportunity is enthralling, said David Grinspoon, Principal Scientist in the Southwest Research Institutes Department of Space Studies, Boulder, Colorado. "Through exploration, we can learn something definite about whether we have living company in the universe beyond Earth. Well, the universe has just dropped us a big hint."
Grinspoon recently authored the book: Lonely Planets: The Natural Philosophy of Alien Life (HarperCollins, November 2003).
"This discovery proves that Mars is indeed an important place for astrobiology exploration a place that should have had life in the past, given our current understanding of life and evolution, a place where we can and should look for fossils of bygone creatures," Grinspoon said.
Thanks to the Mars rover, confirmation has overtaken growing suspicion, Grinspoon said. There are places on Mars which were at one point habitable according to certain untested but widely assumed criteria for what a planet needs to support life, he said.
"We now know that we can go and test our current ideas about life by looking for fossils in these places on Mars, Grinspoon explained.
Among other things, Grinspoon added, the rovers findings will be a major shot in the arm for desires and plans for a future mission that returns martian samples to Earth. "With the right Mars rocks in terrestrial laboratories we will be able to more definitively test the idea that life once graced our red planetary neighbor," he said.
First encounter
Mars history is locked away in the rocks at the Opportunity site, said Jim Rice, a team member of the Mars Exploration Rover Project from Arizona State University in Tempe.
"This is an amazing story. You have Meridiani Planum sitting there looking very unassuming and frankly sort of boring compared to the vast awe inspiring canyon complexes of Valles Marineris and the gargantuan Tharsis volcanoes," Rice told SPACE.com .
Meridiani Planum is a vast, relatively flat and smooth featureless plains region, Rice noted. "Yet it is this very site that will go down in the history books as the first encounter weve had with the past presence of liquid water on another world other than our own home."
The story of Spirit and Opportunity is far from over, Rice predicted. "That proverbial fat lady hasn't even thought so much about humming yether singing is a long, long way off."
Rice likened the Mars rover science team as the 21st century equivalent to Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery that were exploring and discovering a new land 200 years ago.
The future of Mars exploration by both robots and humans is today arguably the best it has ever been, Rice said. "Opportunitys findings -- combined with the President's new space exploration initiative -- make it a great time to be a Mars scientist," Rice stated.
Next page: Smoking gun for life
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