United Arab Emirates details their Mars mission

The United Arab Emirates has released more details about the country’s first Mars mission. For example, the oil state mainly wants to observe the atmosphere of the planet with its Hope satellite. It is the first time that an Arab country sends a spacecraft to Mars.

The United Arab Emirates provide information about the mission on a separate website, NewScientist discovered on Friday. From that site it appears that the spacecraft is mainly made of aluminum and will have a honeycomb-like structure. Hope will be given several goals, including observing the weather. The United Arab Emirates are also trying to find out with the satellite why Mars loses oxygen and hydrogen.

Hope will arrive at Mars in 2021 and is expected to collect 1,000 gigabytes of data, which the satellite will send to Earth. The research center in the emirates will analyze the data by means of various ground stations. After that, the scientists will share the findings with the international Mars community, or so it is described on the site.

With the Mars mission, the United Arab Emirates is trying to compete in the global space race. In addition to the classic players United States, Europe and Russia, China and India are now also participating. Ninety Arab scientists are taking part in the Hope mission, which will start in July 2020. In addition, another two hundred researchers from the United States will help.

At the moment, the American NASA is also busy on Mars. The space agency successfully landed the Curiosity trolley there. That car drives around on Mars and does research into climate change on the red planet. The rover was recently spotted from space.