Phobos And Deimos & Mars Environment Phobos And Deimos & Mars Environment Phobos And Deimos & Mars Environment (PADME) is a low-cost NASA Mars orbiter mission concept that would address longstanding unknowns about Mars' two moons Phobos and Deimos and their environment. The PADME mission competed for Discovery Program funding, but lost to the Psyche and Lucy missions. The mission is led by Anthony Colaprete (Principal Investigator). Other principals include Pascal Lee (Deputy Principal Investigator) and Butler Hine (Project Manager). The origin of Mars' satellites, which were discovered by astronomer Asaph Hall, remains unknown. PADME would advance the scientific understanding of the origin of Phobos and
Martian Moons Exploration Phobos, and land once or twice and gather sand-like regolith particles using a simple pneumatic system. The lander mission aims to retrieve a minimum of samples. The spacecraft will then take off from Phobos and make several flybys of the smaller moon Deimos before sending the Sample Return Capsule back to Earth, arriving in July 2029. The mission architecture uses three modules: propulsion module (1,800 kg), exploration module (150 kg) and the return module (1,050 kg). With the mass of Deimos and Phobos being too small to capture a satellite, it is not possible to orbit the Martian moons in