The Canadian Space Agency (CSA) said it has awarded Quebec City-based ABB Inc. a contract worth about $1.5 million to further develop an instrument that could detect trace amounts of methane directly in the Martian atmosphere.
The instrument is called the Martian Atmospheric Gas Evolution Experiment – Inter-Cavity Optical Spectroscopy, or MAGE-ICOS. Optical spectroscopy is a technique that identifies gases by the way they absorb light. The contract was awarded through the CSA’s Space Technology Development Program (STDP).
The CSA says methane on Mars could offer clues about the planet’s past and present, including whether it may once have supported life. Signals suggesting the gas is there have been detected. However, scientists still do not fully understand where the methane comes from or what processes produce it. The agency calls it one of the planet’s biggest scientific mysteries and says more frequent measurements near the surface could help answer those questions.
The new contract builds on earlier CSA-funded work on the instrument. ABB will refine and test the technology and reduce measurement noise, the random variation that can drown out a faint signal. It will also improve the instrument’s sensitivity under conditions like those in the Martian atmosphere. The company will then build and test a prototype to demonstrate how the instrument performs.
ABB in Quebec City already builds the methane sensors for Montreal-based GHGSat’s satellites, which detect emissions on Earth from orbit by measuring sunlight reflected off the surface. MAGE-ICOS works differently. Instead of observing from a distance, it would sample the Martian air directly, bouncing laser light between mirrors so it passes through the gas many times to pick up faint traces. ABB’s Swiss parent, ABB Ltd, uses the same technique in the methane analyzers it sells for use on Earth, a technology it acquired when it bought California-based Los Gatos Research.
The methane contract is one of several recent CSA awards to ABB. In October, the company received a contribution of nearly $1 million under the STDP for a very-high-resolution optical imaging payload, and last December it was selected to develop an infrared spectrometer for Canada’s Lunar Utility Rover.
The CSA said the work is meant to strengthen Canada’s capabilities in planetary science and bring the Canadian instrument closer to a possible contribution to future international missions to Mars.