Rosalind Franklin and the search for life on Mars

**Sarah Al-Ahmed** (0:03)
The Rosalind Franklin Rover has a ride to Mars. This week on Planetary Radio.
I'm Sarah Al-Ahmed of the Planetary Society, with more of the human adventure across our solar system and beyond. This week, I'm joined by Jorge Vago, ExoMars Project Scientist at the European Space Agency. We'll talk about the Rosalind Franklin rover's journey to the launch pad, the science that it's going to do when it actually gets to Mars, and what's coming up next in the search for life beyond Earth. Then stick around for What's Up with our Chief Scientist Bruce Betts, where we talk about the ExoMars Trace gas orbiter that's been waiting to send the rover's data back to Earth. If you love Planetary Radio and want to stay informed about the latest space discoveries, make sure you hit that subscribe button on your favorite podcasting platform. By subscribing, you'll never miss an episode filled with new and awe-inspiring ways to know the cosmos and our place within it.
The Rosalind Franklin rover has had one of the longest roads to the launch pad of almost any mission in European space agency history. It's part of the ExoMars program, whose first mission, the Trace Gas Orbiter, launched back in 2016 and is still operating at Mars today.
Rosalind Franklin, sometimes called the ExoMars rover, is the second and final piece of the program. First proposed back in 2001, it's weathered partnership changes, redesigns, and no shortage of setbacks along the way. Through all of that, the science at the heart of this mission has stayed remarkably consistent. Rosalind Franklin will be the first Mars rover to combine mobility with the ability to drill two meters beneath the surface. That means that it can reach material that's been shielded from radiation for billions of years. That could teach us so much about Mars' past habitability. The rover is set to land in Oxia Planum, an ancient, clay-rich region that some scientists hypothesize may have once sat along the coast of a vast Martian ocean. My guest today has been with the mission since the very beginning. Dr. Jorge Vago is the ExoMars Project Scientist at the European Space Agency's European Space Research and Technology Center in the Netherlands. And now, after more than two decades, the mission finally has a rocket and some launch windows. Here's my conversation with Jorge Vago.
Hey Jorge, thanks for joining me.

**Jorge Vago** (2:33)
Thank you so much. It's great to be here.

**Sarah Al-Ahmed** (2:36)
And wonderful to have another Mars rover to look forward to. I've been following this mission for so many years, and seeing the developments that have been happening over the last few months has been really exciting.

**Jorge Vago** (2:46)
Indeed. We've had a rather longish development for this mission, longer than most.

**Sarah Al-Ahmed** (2:53)
It's true.
And you've been kind of described as one of ExoMars' founding generation. You've been working on this for so long, and now Rosalind Franklin finally has a rocket and a potential launch window. So for someone who's been in the room from the very start, what does that mean to you to finally have a ride to Mars?

**Jorge Vago** (3:12)
Oh, it's amazing. It's a mixture of elation and relief, I would say, because we started thinking about this mission in 2002 If you think we had the announcement of opportunity for instruments in 2003, that was even before Curiosity did their own.
But we've had so many ups and downs.

**Sarah Al-Ahmed** (3:37)
It's been a long road to get here, but it sounds like we're finally on a good path. We've got a good idea of roughly when it's going to launch. Do you want to give anybody an update on when that launch window actually is?

**Jorge Vago** (3:49)
Actually we have two. So the first launch window is in September, the end of September 2028 But we actually like the second one a lot better, which opens in December 2028 The reason why we like it better is because even though we launch three months later, we arrive four months earlier.
On top of that, the landing is in the morning, which means that the rover, which uses solar panels, has the rest of the day to top up the batteries.

**Sarah Al-Ahmed** (4:25)
What's going to dictate whether or not you go with that first or second launch window?

**Jorge Vago** (4:29)
I think schedule, we are at the moment trying to target the first launch window because if something happens, then we have the second as a backup. But we don't have a backup for the second launch window. So the project team thinks that it's the prudent thing to do to try to make the first launch window.