What is the best Mars mission we have now or that will arrive in December/January, and why do you think so?

Is it:

Mars Global Surveyor
Mars Odyssey
Mars Express
Mars Exploration Rovers
Nozomi

Mars Global Surveyor returns amazing pictures every day (MGS Picture of the Day) and the MOLA instrument on board has allowed us to map Mars's topography. Mars odyssey has discovered dark streaks which could be melting water, huge amounts of ice underground, and discovered that radiation at Mars is high, but acceptable. Mars Express carries an orbiter with GPR, which could discover ground water, and high resolution cameras and other instruments. Beagle 2, its lander, is a dedicated exobiology lab that could find life on Mars. Mars Exploration Rovers are two highly advanced rovers equippped to take very high resolution pictures, analyze thousands of rocks from a distance, take microscopic images of rocks, drill holes in them, and then use special spectrometers. Nozomi seems to be the outcast- launched in 1998 and finally due to arrive in Januray , when it will study the Martian upper atmosphere.

Personally I'm torn between Mars Express and MER. MER is probably the better one, in my opinion - I really like the Athena instrumentation package. On the other hand, the Mars Express orbiter carries some great instruments, namely the radar and the camera, and Beagle 2 has a fair chance of discovering life.

What do you think?

Beagle is cool, but I do like MER very much... The fact that there's two of the ratbags makes it doubly cool! Also, the things that the two robot geologists will be doing boggle the mind... It's about time we get another look at the surface of Mars, from the surface....

All I say is go away Galactic Space Ghoul!

C.

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rovers all the way! oh i hope they call me up to drive them. (hold fingers!)

Had to do MGS (someone had to) - because it's already cool. It brought Mars back home after a long long break (apart from Pathfinder - not in the poll, but I know we're looking at stuff that's still working).

Odyssey is kind of a more precise follow-up to MGS (I know, I know - it has quite different and better instruments, buts that's not the point...)

As for on-the-way stuff, how can we tell?

Beagle 2 (separated from ME): I should have a knee-jerk reflex to vote for this, being British, but it was put together as a one-off in a ridiculously short length of time and on a tiny budget. I don't want to say it's cool or the coolest, because I'm biting my fingernails and I feel I'd jinx it. I do think it will thoroughly deserve a global round of applause if it works. (And it certainly looks cool.)

Mars Express: Pretty good. Not only the first Euro-Mars probe, but also the first good try at evolving a Euro-standard deep space bus. This is of some import, Rosetta has commonality and Europe now has a cheap spin-off mission in the form of Venus Express - and who knows what after? For these subdued reasons, Mars Express is definitely cool in a methodical European way.

MER-A, MER-B: What I find cool (and reassuring) about this pair is not just the advanced technology behind the rovers themselves, but the renewed committment to dual-redundancy (twin launches) that NASA/JPL employed in the Good Old Days. The approach worked. In the cases of Mariners 1/2, 3/4 8/9 (6/7 both got through) one of the spacecraft got there, one didn't, and that turned out to be enough. And if both the craft get through - you've got double the data. Win-win. Oh, and those rovers seriously are cool, true (Sorry, I just have a long-term focus ).

Nozomi: Tenacity. That spacecraft is battered and limping, but they're going to make sure it gets there. That has to be cool in its way - to steer a rather unglamorous spacecraft, mainly designed to study the Martian atmosphere (not search for life like Beagle, motor around the surface doing geology like the MERs - or even use ground-penetrating radar like Mars Express) right to the end, knowing it's probably going to be upstaged by all the other probes anyway. So let's hear it for Nozomi, too.

They're all cool.

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Mars Express, but I'm biased because it's carrying Beagle 2. I really like some of the stuff that Mars Odyssey is returning. By itself, it has pretty much tripled the chances of finding life there.

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Freedom For Fission A breath of fresh Iodine-131

I voted for the rovers, but I agree with this.

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

The one that lands succesfully.

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Two years ago moved from my town
I was looking up past the city lights
But the city lights got in my way

See the constellation ride across the sky
No cigar, no lady on his arm
Just a guy made of dots and lines

-from "See The Constellation"
by They Might Be Giants

The Mars global surveyor has provided remarkable images and lays the groundwork for future studies.

Just think someday we can have a "Mars Hoax" forum where we can debate people that will think we never actually sent probes to Mars.

I voted for the one that still works and will work in the future.

The best mission is the one that I'm on.

I'll second that. I voted for Mars Express, since I am marginally involved with one of the instruments (ELS). We had a launch watch party, too bad the webcast feed was so lousy. We saw everything after T+10s, but missed the best part. I've been meaning to download the replay, but it's just not the same.

(PS. You probably meant physically on the mission. I'd agree with that as well, but didn't see it as a choice on the Poll. )

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Wayne
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"Epistemology models ontology" - John Polkinghorne

I think Mars Express is interesting for the direct measurements on life. The idea of finding microorganisms just bellow the surface really thrills me, although some people think that Mars equator may not be the best place to look at. Also, the "spartan" conception of the project seems very adequate for the present times. The Rovers are my second choice. "Following the water" is a superb task. Surprises may arise.

You have to love them all, but Odyssey continues to amaze.

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"Too low they build, who build beneath the stars". - Edward Young, 1745

I say Pathfinder.
Why? Because I asked several people with no interest in astronomy your question (adding Pathfinder) and Pathfinder was the only one anyone had heard of.
Public interest does more for NASA budgets than most anything else, and that one mission single handedly did so much for interest in exploration.
Others may learn more, but if the public isn't in it, it won't help NASA get more funding for more missions.

Yes, but how many of the general public would have known about it before it was launched? I think the rovers are going to be a big hit for about the same reason as Pathfinder: live (well, almost) images from the surface of Mars!

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

The Rovers, for me, since we don't know what they may come back with. The past missions are still interesting because data is still being obtained from what came back, but the next one is always the most exciting because the possiblities are almost boundless. {Disclaimer: when I say "almost boundless" I'm not picturing bacteria, bits of an extinct civilization, etc. Just new information about our neighbor.}

Psi-less

You guys made a believer out of me! I just voted the Rovers.

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"As I lay beneath the Southern Cross, the stars tell more than I could" . . . David Meece

MGS: for sheer output & carrying the torch after other unfortunate mission failures. Bags of data and inspirational pics. Reliability.
The Rovers and Beagle2 could be great, but they're not there yet.

Very definitely the rovers for me. I cannot for the life of me see what an astronaut can do that a well-equipped rover cannot do better. Maybe astronauts are warm and cuddly and make better news.

Then again, sending astronauts to Mars will bring us the same stupid stuff that certain television programs have been dealing out for the Moon shots.

ljbrs :wink:

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Definitely I´m gonna play Led Zeppelin´s The Rover 8)