“Planetary protection is important and if one were to discover life on Mars then it would be perfectly sensible to say that there are certain areas that ought to be protected,”
“When its size, both actual and financial, is considered, it would be easy to believe Beagle 2 could not be aiming to accomplish much other than just raise a flag on Mars,”
“Unlike (the NASA) robots, Beagle 2 won't be going sightseeing. It is intent on discovering where there is or was life on Mars. It is happy to trade measurements for mobility.”
“You'd also want to use lunar rocks as building supplies - it is so costly to lift even an extra kilo of steel into space, running to many hundreds of thousands of dollars,”
