Just a simple question.

Which of these planetary exploration missions would you prefer to see happening "next?"

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"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer - renowned 19th Century German philosopher.

An easy choice for me: Galilean Moon orbiter. I want to get under Europa's skin as much as she's gotten under mine.

If money and time weren't an issue, though, a Uranian moon orbiter would also be very high on the list. Unfortunately, that bad boy will almost certainly lose any future OP bid to Neptune.

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"Call me old-fashioned, but I think fire is magic. And it scares me a lot."

--The State

I voted for the Uranian orbiter so we can finally have high res pics of the Uranian moons - it would be great to catch the northern hemisphere as well as the southern - best time to get there would be when Uranus is facing the sun edgewise so we can map more on the moons. I suspect there will be interesting science for Miranda and Ariel.

My next picks would be a toss up between the Neptune orbiter and the Galilean orbiter. I also think a flyby mission to 2003 EL61 would be awesome.

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Will 2003 EL61 and 2005 FY9 EVER get names!!

Can't we pick two?

I hate tough choices.

I prefer a return to Titan with a lander capable of roving and flying. Perhaps some type of blimp that can drop probes or even a rover when a it reaches areas of high scientific interest.

My second choice would be to send a lander/rover to Europa.

All of your choices are "flagship", $1.5 billion-plus missions. If any one of them started (as in, design began) today, it would reach its target ten years from now, if not later. So none of them can be "next" mission -- several much smaller missions will happen sooner. Which is fine with me.

So if you rephrase the question "Which BIG planetary exploration mission would you prefer to see happening next?" then my answer is Gallilean Moons Orbiter/Lander -- which is what I voted.

If your question is "Which planetary exploration mission would you prefer to see happening that would actually have a chance to be launched NEXT?" then my answer is: Deep Impact-style excavator on Saturn's moon Phoebe. For a long time there will be no better way to examine composition of a pristine Kuiper Belt Object. Power requirements of "mother ship" could be met with solar+batteries if Cassini acts as a transmission relay. In fact, if Cassini could be directed close to Phoebe during impact, there is no need for a mother ship at all -- but I do not know if this is physically possible.

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Fiction has to be plausible. Reality is under no such constraint.

I put "next" in quotes for exactly the reasons you ascribe to the question. The timeframes with these sort of things are so long its hard to know exactly what "next" means - as you amply illustrate.

The other reason being, I'm not sure which of these missions are currently on drawing boards / temporarily shelved / "permanently" shelved (what does that word mean in this context? 20 years? 30 years?) / planning stages etc.

I agree Jetlack - it is a tough question, but I particularly didn't offer multiple choice because then I know I would have ticked at least the first 4 possibilities myself, and I'm sure others would have done the same! (ie Pointless survey!)

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BugMeNot A portal to bypass free-site registration.

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed, and third, it is accepted as self-evident." Arthur Schopenhauer - renowned 19th Century German philosopher.

I voted for Uranus, mainly because its atmospheric wind patterns. Planetary poles facing almost straight into the sun will certainly create wind circulation patterns very different from those with relatively low axial tilt. This means that instead of the semipermanent pressure and wind systems we have on earth at latitudes (both hemispheres) 0-30-60-90, we're bound to have quite a number of other things.

Looks like either Titan or Jupiter votes will get their wish:

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Fiction has to be plausible. Reality is under no such constraint.

Not planetary, but I'd like to see some more landers on Near Earth Asteroids. Maybe even a sample return.

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"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

I voted for the Galilean moons, but I think that Ganymede is much much more interesting than Europa or Callisto, at least from a space plasma physical point of view. Not that I will not continue to work on Europa data.

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Optimism does not change the laws of physics. (T'Pol)
A good scientist has freed himself of concepts and keeps his mind open to what is. (Dao De Jing 27)
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Martin ( http://www.geocities.com/DrMartinV )

Why not Io? Why everyone is for dead icy moons? Callisto!? It may have a subsurface layer of water, but it's not a big deal. Even Europa may not have enough internal energy to support life, not to mention Callisto whose possible ocean is colder.

I'd like to see orbiters around BOTH Uranus and Neptune. These two very fascinating systems are seriously understudied. Between the two, Neptune wins because of Triton, but that doesn't mean Uranus system isn't interesting.

Too bad NASA is not interested in a New Horizons II type mission. It was a proposed Uranus/KBO flyby mission. Distant orbiters are probably too ambitious, but icy giant/KBO flyby missions could provide valuable science from the distant outer Solar System.

Another type of a very cool mission could be a main asteroid belt mission where a probe conducts numerous flybys of different asteroids.

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

Really?

http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=1660
http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/abs.../ast.2007.0156

"Such an ocean would be energetically hospitable for terrestrial marine macrofauna."

We already have that kind of mission on way. Dawn.

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Sanity is overrated.
Butterfly.

Really. Read this book.

Wild speculation. We don't really know. In fact, we're not even sure if there is an ocean there.

Dawn will orbit Vesta and Ceres, I don't know if it will conduct other asteroid flybys. By "numerous" I mean many. Dozens or more.

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

Well, I will not argue here. Anything at that moment is speculation. But...

...I am fairly sure that scientists are fairly sure that is salty ocean down there.

Because of Dawn, next asteroid mission will wait a few years at least.

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Sanity is overrated.
Butterfly.

I said Neptune because I am listening to Johnny Cash.

No, j/k. I like Cash (music and money both), but Neptune because it fascinates me something could be so far out and so...well, so awesome. Saturn is a ridiculously long way and to have stuff farther yet...wow.

Better yet, what if we did a twin mission to Uranus and Neptune both? Like having two Voyagers or two Mars Rovers? Aside from the material cost, is it that much more expensive to develop the same program and just build it twice? If the research for both and development for both is the same...is it just a matter of building and launching or is there more to it than that?

Obviously analyzing the data takes more people, but can that be spread out over time and to universities to ease the load?

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None to speak of

I vote 'Something Else'
We might not know everything about our planets but I think we know enough for the moments
(thats 9 planets if you're one of those traditionalists counting pluto and it has an American mission on the way in 2015)

A dedicated exoplanet mission like TPF would be my choice
(there are over 200 exoplanets out there most we know little about except for their mass and orbital parameters)
or a Europa sub surface explorer.

There is evidence of an ocean, but a warm "slush" cannot be ruled out, unfortunately.

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman