ESA signs final contract for ExoMars

BBC : The European Space Agency’s (ESA’s) planned ExoMars mission remains on track following Monday’s signing of industrial contracts with the mission’s prime contractor, Thales Alenia Space. The program includes several spacecraft that will be sent to Mars on two launches. Among them are the Trace Gas Orbiter, which is scheduled to launch in 2016 and will search for atmospheric methane, and the ExoMars rover, which is scheduled to launch in 2018 and will look for signs of life by drilling into the ground. Working in partnership with the ESA is the Russian space agency Roscosmos, which stepped up its participation after the US dropped out of the mission in 2012 because of budgetary problems.