A Japanese mission to bring samples from a Martian moon back to Earth is set to launch into space from the southwestern prefecture of Kagoshima.
The Martian Moons eXploration mission, or MMX, will lift off on an H3 rocket from the Tanegashima Space Center at around 4:41 a.m. on Tuesday, Japan time, which is 7:41 p.m. on Monday, UTC.
The mission is designed to become the first in the world to land on the Martian moon Phobos, collect samples from its surface and deliver them to Earth.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, led the project to develop the three-module mission. The total development cost for the mission is 55.3 billion yen, or roughly 350 million dollars.
The exploration module features four landing legs designed to touch down on Phobos, which has only about one-2,000th of Earth’s gravity.
It also carries sampling equipment, various observation instruments, and two super hi-vision cameras jointly developed by NHK and JAXA.
The mission is expected to reach the vicinity of Mars about one year after the launch. It will then spend three years conducting observations.
The exploration module is scheduled to land on Phobos and collect at least 10 grams of sample material from the moon’s surface layer at a depth of 2 centimeters or more.
The return module will likely deliver the samples to Earth during the fiscal year that ends in March of 2032.
JAXA hopes the mission will help it develop techniques necessary to explore the Martian sphere. It also hopes the mission will shed more light on the origin of Phobos.