A sample return mission is a spacecraft mission with the goal of collecting and returning with tangible samples from an extraterrestrial location to Earth for analysis. Sample return missions may bring back merely atoms and molecules or a deposit of complex compounds such as loose material ("soil") and rocks. These samples may be obtained in a number of ways, including a collector array used for capturing particles of solar wind or cometary debris, soil and rock excavation, mining, and any other possible way for retrieving samples in the environment.
Read more about Sample Return Mission: Relevance of Samples From Solar System Bodies, See Also
Famous quotes containing the words sample, return and/or mission:
“All that a city will ever allow you is an angle on it—an oblique, indirect sample of what it contains, or what passes through it; a point of view.”
—Peter Conrad (b. 1948)
“To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.”
—Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950)
“Not in vain is Ireland pouring itself all over the earth. Divine Providence has a mission for her children to fulfill; though a mission unrecognized by political economists. There is ever a moral balance preserved in the universe, like the vibrations of the pendulum. The Irish, with their glowing hearts and reverent credulity, are needed in this cold age of intellect and skepticism.”
—Lydia M. Child (1802–1880)