Figure 2-2 from the National Academies
of Science report

A new report released today by the National Academies of Science, entitled “Highest Priority Science for the First Human Missions to Mars,” is essentially the first attempt by the planetary science community to plan its future science missions to Mars using the gigantic capabilities that SpaceX’s Starship is expected to provide them.

You can download the report here.

Even though the report made the search for life on Mars its big priority — a bugaboo that NASA and the science community trots out repeatedly to garner clicks from the ignorant propaganda press — this report is radically different then all previous similar NASA studies proposing future Mars exploration, as indicated by the graphics from figure 2-2 of the report to the right. Unlike those past studies, which were badly limited by the inadequate capabilities of any spacecraft NASA could send to Mars, this new report recognizes how much the game is changed by SpaceX’s Starship.

First, the new panel did not attempt to place any limit on any landing zones. Earlier reports had forbidden landings in the high latitudes or high altitudes because of the risks to NASA’s proposed landers. Starship overcomes much of those risks, giving researchers much greater flexibility.

Second, the focus of the missions will not be solely devoted to scientific or geological research, as had been the case for all previous similar reports by NASA and the academic community. Instead, the proposed research goals includes important engineering and human exploration requirements outside of science, including efforts to use the resources on Mars itself as well as find locations better suited for human habitation. Once again, the vastly greater capabilities of Starship influenced this change.

Even more important, the study doesn’t assume the future missions will be unmanned, as all previous NASA reports have done. In fact, it does the opposite, proposing multiple 30-day manned missions, as shown in the graphic. One set of three missions would go to three different locations, while another set of three missions would focus on one place in particular.

Much of this shift towards manned flight I think stemmed from the presence on the panel of representatives from the private companies SpaceX and The Exploration Company (a French startup), as well as an engineer from the National Academy of Engineering. Previously studies were almost always entirely dominated by planetary scientists, so the goals outlined were always focused on their interests. Now the idea of human exploration has become prevalent.

The panel’s work was clearly also influenced by the realization that SpaceX’s Starship is not only far more capable, its first flights are just around the corner. SpaceX plans sending it numerous times to Mars in the very near future, as shown in the graphic below that Elon Musk released during a presentation in May 2025.


The Musk game plan for Mars exploration over the next few years.

While that plan is probably going to see some delays, it is also probably going to play out more or less as Musk envisions it. NASA and academia had better get its pins in order to take advantage of that capability, or it will miss out. Today’s report is its first stab at doing so.

In this context the panel recommended two things that are quite ambitious. First, a real research laboratory should be sent on Starship to Mars, “consisting of a variety of geologic, astrobiologic, and biomolecular analytical tools and analysis capabilities.” No more robots. Put a real lab on the planet with the scientists there capable of analyzing samples on a daily basis.

Second, the panel recommended that Starship bring fully capable drilling rigs to the planet so that actual deep cores could be obtained from multiple locations. Imagine, we might soon be seeing drilling crews obtaining cores from the polar ice caps, allowing scientists to finally and precisely map the entire geological history of Mars, which in turn will help map the solar system’s own history, and the Earth’s as well.

The report also notes a major political obstacle to this ambitious human Mars exploration, the limitations placed on human activity on other planets due to the planetary protection rules imposed by international interpretations of the Outer Space Treaty. Those interpretations actually forbid much human exploration on Mars out of fear of disturbing or destroying any possible life that might be there, as well as contaminating Earth life with that theorized alien life.

The problem is that there is no evidence any life exists on Mars. In fact, the data so far suggests if it ever was there, it is now long gone. Furthermore, the rules are simply impractical for future generations, as they preclude any real colonization anywhere in the solar system.

Though this report is very diplomatic about the issue, it makes it clear that changes are going to be required. As it notes:

Although today’s planetary protection guidelines are inconsistent with human exploration, the world-class science to be conducted by human explorers of Mars is an impetus for continued investment in the tools and knowledge that address contamination risks and inform these guidelines. By integrating this work early in the mission development process, human Mars exploration campaigns can achieve the required levels of scientific integrity and backward contamination risks.

In other words, the rules are going to have be changed. Humans are going to Mars, whether or not the international globalist bureaucrats in the UN and at NASA like it.

All in all, this report is a refreshing change. It signals the coming revolution in human space exploration, and lays out with courage some of the ambitious things that will now possible due to Starship. And rather than see Elon Musk’s company as an evil villain who must be stopped, the panelists instead viewed his company as a wonderful resource to be mined. For everyone’s mutual benefit.

Or as they say in science fiction: Ad astra!