Current Affairs - Technology - Discussion

Japan launched the Martian Moons Exploration (MMX) mission in October 2026 to collect soil samples from Phobos, the larger and innermost moon of Mars. The spacecraft was launched aboard Japan’s H3 rocket from the Tanegashima Space Centre. The mission aims to collect at least 10 grams of material from Phobos to investigate its origin and determine whether Mars’s moons formed from a giant impact or were captured asteroids. The mission also includes the Idefix rover, developed by France and Germany, to survey the surface. The spacecraft is expected to return its samples to Earth in 2031.