Origins, Worlds, and Life A Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology 2023-2032 (2022) / Chapter Skim
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22 Recommended Program: 2023-2032 This chapter outlines a prioritized program of research activities to advance the frontiers of planetary science, astrobiology, and planetary defense in the 2023-2032 decade. The recommended program, traced directly from the priority science questions, defines an integrated portfolio of flight projects, high-priority research activities, and technology development that will produce transformative advances in our knowledge and understanding.
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Across these themes, the committee defined 12 priority science questions, shown in Box 22.1, each comprised of a single overarching topic and a brief description of the question's scope. Chapters 3 through 15 describe these priority questions, as well as specific sub-questions and Strategic Research activities for each that would provide substantial advances in understanding over the next decade.
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BOX 22.1. Twelve Priority Science Questions Scientific Themes Priority Science Question Topics and Descriptions A)
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Frontiers program supports medium-class missions. Large missions are commonly referred to as Flagship missions.
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The past 30 years of planetary robotic exploration has generally followed a progression of mission types -- from reconnaissance flybys, to orbital investigations, to in situ exploration, to sample return -- at a growing number of target destinations. Each step along this progression allows us to address more sophisticated and challenging scientific questions, with a commensurate increase in mission and instrumentation complexity and cost.
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Operating Missions NASA has been remarkably successful in launching and operating planetary missions in the past decade. Currently operating PSD spacecraft include the ongoing Mars orbiter missions, the Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rovers, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, the InSight and Lucy Discovery missions, and the New Horizons, Juno, and OSIRIS-REx New Frontiers missions.
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This mission will provide a critical foundation for the exploration of ocean worlds through its focused exploration of an important target of high astrobiological interest. As a large, Flagship class mission, its budgetary growth has the potential to undercut other parts of the planetary program if not closely monitored and thoughtfully controlled.
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and chirality; and establishing that such features are indigenous through pre-processing, nanometer scale textural interrogation and follow-up observations with multiple methods. • Constraining the nature and longevity of environments with liquid water, and assessing habitability and volatile inventory.
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situation there is clearly potential for mission cost growth particularly if the 2026-2028 launch window is not achieved. Given the financial scale of MSR, cost growth has the potential to severely negatively impact other NASA planetary science programs.
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potential to emulate the successful MEP model by supporting activities focused on the Moon such as those listed above for Mars. The Moon's greater proximity and accessibility affords tremendous opportunities for frequent missions with increasingly sophisticated payloads, growing commercial and international partnerships, and advancement of decadal-level science 13 through coordination with near-term human exploration activities planned for the next decade.
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The committee reaffirms findings of the Midterm Review4 regarding the importance of coordinating Mars exploration and managing the MEP as a program, rather than just as a series of missions, in order to optimize science at the architectural level. Finding: MEP has a record of success and it has advanced our understanding of Mars and the evolutionary paths of terrestrial planets while also fostering, e.g., technological developments, identification of opportunities for joint mission implementation, and public enthusiasm for planetary science.
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change (Q6) , and key questions are whether any habitable environments persist to the present and whether they are inhabited.
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Science Strategy and Integration Office (ESSIO) and integrates and coordinates the Artemis science efforts across the SMD divisions, across NASA directorates, and with other US and international agencies.
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Recommendation: PSD should execute a strategic program to accomplish planetary science objectives for the Moon, with an organizational structure that aligns responsibility, authority, and accountability. The NRC's "The Scientific Context for the Exploration of the Moon" report in 2007 provided a set of lunar science concepts, goals, and recommendations that have informed subsequent studies and lunar community activities.
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BOX 22.2 Science Themes for Lunar Exploration The central goal of a science-driven program of lunar discovery and exploration is to reveal the history of major events and processes that have shaped the Earth–Moon system and the solar system. The committee prioritizes three overarching Science Themes that address (1)
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Transformative Science Enabled by a Synergistic Robotic-Human Partnership While the Discovery, current CLPS, and SIMPLEx programs provide opportunities to address focused science objectives at the Moon, broader science goals require more ambitious and complex missions. A fundamental science goal is to utilize the Moon to investigate the early dynamical and impact history of the solar system (Box 22.2)
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Recommendation: Endurance-A should be implemented as a strategic medium-class mission as the highest priority of the Lunar Discovery and Exploration Program. Endurance-A would utilize CLPS to deliver the rover to the Moon, a long-range traverse to collect a substantial mass of high value samples, and astronauts to return them to Earth.
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in planetary defense and LDEP during this period. However, proportional investments in R&A have not kept up with this growth in PSD activities.
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• Understanding life in extreme environments on Earth is highly relevant to the next decade of solar system exploration. First, life in isolated refugia and ephemeral environments on Earth (e.g., in terrestrial deserts)
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conjunction with ESA's Hera follow-up assessment mission, and the Near-Earth Object Surveyor Mission (NEO Surveyor) exemplify this synergy (e.g., NASEM 2019)
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significantly less than 10 years. The specific Discovery missions are outside the scope of decadal recommendations, but the overall program warrants evaluation and recommendations.
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launches. Inclusion of this innovative program promises to increase launch cadence overall within the Discovery program and provides flexibility to achieve a balanced portfolio across targets and maintain a continuous stream of new data to the planetary science community.
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reaffirms Vision and Voyages arguments that launch vehicles be excluded from the Discovery cost cap. However, Phase E costs can vary substantially across different missions.
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infrequently. It is therefore essential that NF missions be strategically designed to address the most important questions put forward by the science community.
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per year should be added to this cap, with quiet cruise to include normal cruise instrument checkout and simple flyby measurements, outbound and inbound trajectories for sample return missions, and long transit times between objects for multiple-target missions. Mission Study Process and Technical Evaluation The program portfolio recommended below was designed to achieve an appropriate balance among mission classes.
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cost estimate for the purpose of this decadal survey, and are only intended to be representative of a potential implementation approach. Prioritized New Large Strategic Missions The decadal survey considered six candidate flagship missions for the decade 2023-2032 that were judged to have exceptional scientific merit, based on their ability to address priority science questions Q1 through Q12.
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an inherently different class of planet than gas-rich Jupiter and Saturn. The committee's prioritization of the UOP mission reaffirms its identification in Vision and Voyages as the next highest priority flagship after MAX-C and the Jupiter Europa Orbiter, whose derivative missions (Perseverance and Europa Clipper)
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partnership between NASA and ESA. Indeed, the 2021 report of the Voyage 2050 Senior Committee recommends that ESA pursue a substantial, medium class contribution to an ice giant orbiter mission led by an international partner.
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• Mercury Lander. This mission, as proposed, would deliver a lander with a suite of instruments to the surface of the innermost planet to gain insight into the original distribution of elements in the earliest stages of solar system development and to learn how planets and exoplanets form and evolve in close proximity to their host stars.
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Prioritized New Frontiers Missions New Frontiers (NF) Announcement of Opportunities (AOs)
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mission themes to be prioritized. NF-4 and NF-5 calls had, or will have, 6 and 7 mission themes, respectively.
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• Determine degree of aqueous alteration on a Centaur to investigate the biologic potential of icy planetesimals and potential brine reservoirs The mission shall address all four objectives. Ceres Sample Return focuses on quantifying Ceres' current habitability potential and its origin, which is important for understanding habitability of mid-sized planetary bodies.
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high, leading to fragmentation of large molecules, and ambiguity as to the precise identity of the parent organic molecules. 28 Science Objectives: • Search for and identify complex organic molecules in Enceladus plume materials, with velocities <4 km/s and sample volume >1 µl with appropriate contamination control to enable life-detection investigations • Determine the composition, energy sources, and physicochemical conditions of Enceladus' ocean to assess its habitability • Characterize Enceladus's cryovolcanic activity to determine spatial and compositional variations in plume activity and the processes causing ocean material ejection and modification.
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Saturn Probe obtains in situ measurements of the atmosphere from an entry probe. Understanding the initial conditions in the protosolar nebula requires measurements of each of the giant planets' elemental and isotopic compositions.
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Titan orbiter and did not achieve global coverage, and Titan's upper atmospheric composition is not known and will not be measured by Dragonfly. Vision and Voyages evaluated a Titan Flagship to cover a wide range of science goals, and Titan Orbiter in combination with Dragonfly would cover most of the science envisaged for that flagship mission, which was broader in scope than the NF-4 Ocean Worlds Titan mission theme.
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vehicles continue to evolve. These factors placed this theme at lower priority for NF-6 and NF-7 than other themes that clearly require a medium-class mission to complete their core science.
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our understanding of these worlds. The Recommended Program restores the strong recommendation from Vision and Voyages, endorsed by this committee, for a cadence of two NF missions per decade.
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New Flagship #2 1,040 Total 41,120 34,990 NOTE: Costs are in real year dollars assuming 2 percent annual inflation. 1R&A budget levels reflect a 10 percent per year funding increase for openly competed R&A programs sufficient to bring the annual investment in R&A to ≥ 10 percent of the annual PSD budget by mid-decade; non-openly competed R&A activities are increased by inflation at 2 percent/yr; see "Recommended Funding for NASA Planetary R&A" section of Chapter 17 for details.
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FIGURE 22.1. Recommended program for the 2023 to 2032 decade.
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FIGURE 22.2. Level Program for the 2023 to 2032 Decade.
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Science Traceability of Prioritized Large and Medium-class Missions The large- and medium-class strategic and PI-led missions prioritized and recommended in the preceding sections of this report were selected based on their ability to address the priority science questions, as well as programmatic balance, technical risk and readiness, and cost. After these missions had been selected, the committee evaluated this portfolio of new missions to assess how well they covered the breadth of the priority science questions (Q1-Q12)
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STATE OF PROFESSION The committee's Statement of Task explicitly requested an assessment of the state of the planetary science and astrobiology communities, and Chapter 16 is devoted to this topic. The state of the profession (SoP)
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Mars Sample Receiving Facility The processing and analysis of samples returned from Mars will occur in three separate stages: 1) initial receiving and characterization to verify that the samples can be safely distributed; 2)
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expected to be retired and will no longer be available for this decadal's prioritized missions. At the same time, new launch vehicle entrants -- e.g., SPACEX Starship and Blue Origin New Glenn -- are emerging from a variety of companies, both established aerospace manufacturers and ‘new-space' enterprises.
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The loss of the Arecibo Observatory planetary radar program has resulted in a significant gap in solar system observations, particularly in support of planetary defense. Radar observations are the most precise method for NEO astrometry, and provide important data needed to constrain small body size and spin states, improving our knowledge of the NEO population (see Chapters 7 and 18)
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