Washington, 27 feb ( EFE).- NASA has named the Puerto Rican Orlando Figueroa at the head of the new group formed for planning the Mars exploration programme, as announced today the agency space American said in a statement.
The first task Figueroa will develop a framework for action before the next 15th.
Figueroa, 56 years of age and who was previously the Deputy Director for science and technology in the Goddard Center of space flight (Maryland), has more than 30 years of aerospace experience and will have to address the scientific and technical team that will develop a strategy for American of Mars exploration.
Associate Administrator of NASA for scientific missions, John Grunsfeld, indicated that the initial task of the team will focus on a possible mission with robots between 2018 and 2020. Development of the programme framework is drawn up according to the scientific community and could be available for review in the middle of the year.
The new program, he added, will incorporate elements of research and technology advanced to develop “a logical sequence of missions to answer fundamental scientific questions and ultimately support the goal of sending humans to Mars,” said Grunsfeld.
La NASA concluded a phase in its history with the last mission, the last year of a space shuttle.
The Government of President Barack Obama has indicated its commitment to the exploration of Mars and the goal of sending humans sometime in the Decade of 2020.
Turn Newt Gingrich, one of four applicants for the Republican presidential nomination this year, promised that there will be a base with humans on the Moon in ten years, and that his Government would accelerate Manned Mars missions.
But in its budget for fiscal 2013 plan President Obama included cuts of about 225 million in the programme of missions to Mars, which will begin to affect after the artifact browser Curiosity descend on this planet in August.
La NASA has a long history of exploration on Mars: the artifact Opportunity descended on this planet in March 2004 and continues to operate long after the expiration of the period of 90 days for which is was planned originally.
There are currently two NASA satellites orbiting the red planet: Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Odyssey, which continues to send scientific information and images unprecedented.
The Curiosity will assess if Mars had in the past or currently has an environment that can support life.
In 2013, Nasa will launch the satellite Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, the first mission dedicated to understanding of the upper atmosphere of Mars.
But this month the American space agency announced that he was leaving the joint mission with Europe to explore Mars, that it planned to send a spacecraft in 2016 to detect possible gases produced by microbes and 2018 a drilling robot capable of finding life in the basement.
Puerto Rican Orlando Figueroa will lead the team that will develop a strategy for American exploration of Mars. EFE/file
