The New Space Race: Bringing Home Untouched Mars, Phobos, and Asteroid Samples

NASA’s Mars Sample Return architecture has effectively been unwound in favor of a Mars Future Missions technology line, shifting the race for pristine samples to China and Japan with campaigns targeting Mars, the Martian moon Phobos, and the near-Earth asteroid Kamo'oalewa. Perseverance has collected roughly 30 sealed samples but there is currently no funded retrieval mission in the U.S. pipeline. Looking ahead, China’s Tianwen-2 aims for Kamo'oalewa with a 2026–27 rendezvous and a 2027 return, Japan’s MMX targets Phobos samples for around 2031, and China’s Tianwen-3 aims to return Martian material around 2030–31; if Tianwen-3 succeeds, China would deliver the first Martian samples, though the Jezero collection remains scientifically richer and presently unfunded for retrieval under U.S. policy.