UC Berkeley scientists to launch NASA mission to Mars

"UC Berkeley scientists are in charge of two identical satellites, nicknamed Blue and Gold to honor the university's colors, set to launch for Mars as soon as Sunday. Leading NASA's ESCAPADE mission, the team based at UC Berkeley's Space Sciences Laboratory's mission operations center will manage the twin satellites as they take off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, this weekend and travel to Mars by 2027."

"The goal of the mission is to create a 3D map of the Red Planet's magnetic fields and atmosphere to assist future human communication and survival on Mars. This is the first time UC Berkeley has led a planetary mission. "There's quite a long list of what I'm excited about," Robert Lillis, the ESCAPADE principal investigator from the Space Sciences Laboratory, told SFGATE. "This is a mission that's going to collect important information for sending future astronauts to Mars." The data these satellites collect could reveal how Mars lost its atmosphere and the conditions that could impact people who plan to stay on the planet, which has few protections against damaging solar storms."

"The two spacecraft will zoom around together to capture the magnetic fields, upper atmosphere and ionosphere of Mars. "We will be making the space weather measurements we need to understand the system well enough to forecast solar storms whose radiation could harm astronauts on the surface of Mars or in orbit," Lillis said in a statement. Previously, spacecraft to Mars could only launch during a short window every two years in order to make a fuel-efficient exit from Earth's orbit into Mars' orbit."

UC Berkeley's Space Sciences Laboratory will operate two identical satellites, nicknamed Blue and Gold, launching from Cape Canaveral and traveling to Mars by 2027. The ESCAPADE mission aims to build a three-dimensional map of Mars' magnetic fields, upper atmosphere and ionosphere to improve understanding of atmospheric loss and space weather. Collected data will support forecasting harmful solar storms and inform communication, radiation risk mitigation, and survival strategies for future astronauts. The mission represents UC Berkeley's first lead of a planetary mission and will test a more flexible trajectory to allow more frequent departures to Mars.

Read at SFGATE