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The Conversation
The Conversation
Daniel Brown, Lecturer in Astronomy, Nottingham Trent University

Japan’s MMX mission aims to swipe soil samples from Mars’ moon Phobos

The MMX spacecraft will enter Martian orbit before attempting to collect samples from Phobos. Jaxa

A Japanese space mission is about to launch towards Mars. But it will not land on the planet itself. Instead, the Martian Moons Exploration (MMX) mission will focus on Phobos, the bigger of Mars’s two small moons.

The mission will lift off on Monday October 19 at 20:41 BST on an H3 rocket from the Tanegashima Space Center, in the south of Japan.

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