In a few years, the Marian Moons eXploration or MMX mission, will launch to the moons of Mars. Built by the Japanese Space Agency, JAXA, Australia is now a part of this mission adding to a growing list of missions our two countries are collaborating on.
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The moons of Mars are very different to our Moon. Firstly, Mars has 2 - Phobos, named after the Greek god of fear and Deimos, named after the Greek god of panic.
Our Moon is about 3,475km wide, a bit smaller than the width of Australia. On the other hand, the moons of Mars are tiny. Deimos is about 26km wide and Phobos is 16km wide, making them smaller than Canberra.
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Their formation as a natural satellite, the scientific term for a moon is also very different. The leading theory on how the Moon (our natural satellite) formed was due to an impact collision between a small protoplanet the size of Mars, called Theia, and Earth. The resulting collision and rock that flung out eventually produced the Moon.
However, Phobos and Deimos have a different history. Current measurements suggest that their composition is similar to asteroids in the Asteroid Belt, leading us to the theory that they are actually asteroids that have been captured by Mars' gravitational pull.
They also orbit relatively close to Mars. Phobos is about 9,400km away from Mars and Deimos nearly 23,500km away. This makes them much closer to Mars han the Moon is to Earth - which is on average 384,400 km away. Phobos and Deimos are closer to Mars than even our man-made satellites in Geostationary Orbit.
Scientists think that due to their proximity, they may have lots of dirt and rocks from Mars that were flung off when meteors have hit Mars. Going to Phobos means we can not only study it, but gain a lot of insight into Mars itself.
The MMX mission will visit the moons of Mars, and land on Phobos, taking samples and returning to Earth. And not just return to Earth, but land in South Australia in 2029.
This isn't the first mission Japan and Australia have worked together on. Recently, the Hayabusa2 mission went to the asteroid Ryugu. Launched at the end of 2014, it made the long trip to the asteroid, which is believed to have formed from some of the earliest stuff in our Solar System.
Twice it went down to the surface, scooped up rocks, and hopped back off. It then left the asteroid, and made the long trip back, parachuting the samples down into Woomera, South Australia in December 2020.
Now, the MMX mission will be the first to take samples back from one of the moons of Mars and return them to Earth.
It will also carry a suite of instruments. This will include an 8K camera, providing 8K resolution images of both Phobos and Deimos as well as Mars. Mars images are about to go to a whole new level of quality.
It will also deploy a rover on Phobos, built by the French Space Agency - CNES and the Germany Aerospace Centre - DLR.
Phobos might be named after the Greek god of fear, but there is only excitement and awesome science ahead for Japan and Australia in space exploration.
- Brad Tucker is an astrophysicist and cosmologist at Mt Stromlo Observatory and the National Centre for the Public Awareness of Science at the ANU.
