The primary task of the new Mars rover, which NASA is to send to the Red Planet in 2020, is to find traces of life on Mars. The designers will borrow the general design and the undercarriage from the current Curiosity rover. This will help cut the costs, but the gear will be different. Experts believe that Russian equipment could be used there as well.

Despite the fact that mass media often say that Curiosity is specifically looking for traces of life on Mars, it is not so. Its goal is to find out if the conditions for the existence of microorganisms could have ever existed on the planet.

The answer is already known: "yes, they could have". That is why based on the experience of Curiosity as well as earlier rovers, a new project called "Mars 2020" will be prepared, which is the next and quite logical step in exploring the planet.

In January the Mars 2020 Science Definition Team was launched at NASA - it is a group of specialists who published a large report with recommendations on what the new rover should be like and what its tasks will be.

The apparatus is to conduct a microscopic analysis - a first in the history of Mars exploration. It is to collect samples of the soil, which then will be delivered to Earth. And finally, it will check how the teams of future piloted missions could use the resources of Mars.

On the whole, the tasks of the new expedition are of a larger scale than those of Curiosity, believes Maxim Litvak, a leading researcher at the spectroscopy laboratory at the Institute of Space Exploration of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

"I hope that in the event of this larger scale mission a greater distance will be covered on the surface of the planet and more opportunities to study the soil matter in its deeper layers will present themselves. If now Curiosity has drilled the surface and gathered samples from 5-7 cm in depth, here the depths will be even greater. Perhaps it will be used for the future return of the soil samples from Mars to Earth. In general, it is an evolutionary development of the Curiosity rover".

After studying the recommendations, NASA will determine the set of equipment to be used on board the new Mars rover. After that NASA will announce an open tender to develop the scientific "systems" needed. Most likely, Mars 2020 will be an international project as well as Curiosity, continues Maxim Litvak.

"Some of the equipment will be developed with international partnership. As far as Russia's participation goes, I think that the Russian scientists will be interested in offering scientific equipment for the rover. But it will all depend on how such

Source: Voice of Russia