The Mars Ascent Vehicle team completed critical wind tunnel testing at a NASA facility in preparation for the first rocket launch from Mars. This joint effort by NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) aims to return Martian samples to Earth by the early 2030s, providing insights into the planet's ancient history and potential microbial life.

This illustration shows NASA's Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV) undergoing powered flight. The MAV will send tubes containing Martian rock and soil samples into orbit around Mars. ESA's Earth Return Orbiter spacecraft will load the samples into a highly secure sealed capsule and send them to Earth. Source: NASA

The MAV (Mars Ascent Vehicle) team recently completed wind tunnel testing at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, a facility that has been an important part of NASA's Apollo program missions.

The facility has provided valuable testing for NASA's low-Earth orbit and lunar missions, and is now helping the agency prepare to launch its first rocket from Mars. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the European Space Agency (ESA) jointly plan to bring scientifically screened Mars samples to Earth in the early 2030s, and the Mars vehicle is an important part of the plan.

Wind tunnel test engineer Sam Schmitz loads a scale model of the Mars rover into the three-phase wind tunnel at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center for testing. This 14×14-inch wind tunnel has been used to test the configuration of Artemis, Redstone, Jupiter-C, Saturn and other launch vehicles. Source: NASA/Jonathan Dell

Annie Catherine Barnes, MAV's head of aeroacoustics and co-lead of the July testing event, said the team conducted multiple angle tests on scale models in the wind tunnel to understand the impact that airflow might have on the MAV's structure. Barnes compared it to turbulence on an airplane.

A scale model of the Mars Orbiter is tested in Marshall's three-channel wind tunnel. The test section of the wind tunnel is only 14 inches tall and wide, but wind speeds can reach Mach 5. Source: NASA

"We're looking for turbulent areas for launch vehicles," she said. "We are looking for shock oscillations and large-area pressure fluctuations that could lead to structural responses." The team will use data from the July test campaign and other analyzes to better estimate the environment MAV will face when it becomes the first launch vehicle to launch from the surface of another planet.

This illustration shows NASA's proposed concept for a Mars sample retrieval lander that would carry a small rocket (about 10 feet or 3 meters tall) called the Mars Ascent Vehicle to the Martian surface. The rocket will be loaded with sealed tubes of Martian rock and soil samples collected by NASA's Perseverance rover and then launched into Mars orbit. The samples will then be transported to Earth for detailed analysis. Source: NASA/JPL-Caltech

MAV supports the planned Mars sample return campaign, which will bring scientifically selected samples to Earth for study using the world's most advanced instruments. This strategic partnership with ESA is developing technology and preliminary designs for the first mission to return samples from another planet. Now, samples collected by NASA's Perseverance rover during its exploration of an ancient river delta have the potential to shed light on Mars' early evolution, including the possibility of ancient microbial life.

Under the management of Marshall, the MAV will launch from Earth with a sample recovery lander on a two-year journey to Mars. It will stay on the surface of Mars for nearly a year and receive samples collected by Perseverance.

Artist's impression of ESA's Earth Return Orbiter. Image source: ESA/ATGMedialab

After the sample transfer arm on the lander loads the sample into a container in the rocket, the MAV will be launched from Mars into orbit around Mars, releasing the sample container for capture by the Earth Return Orbiter developed by ESA. The samples are expected to arrive on Earth in the early 2030s. The Mars sample return program is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California.