page_title: Icebreaker Life
section_title: Proposed payload
hierarchical_section_title: Icebreaker Life / Proposed payload
caption_attribution_description: English: Members of the "Icebreaker Life" mission to Mars team during drill automation testing at the University Valley, Antarctica, a Mars-analog site.
context_page_description: Icebreaker Life is a Mars lander mission concept proposed to NASA's Discovery Program. The mission involves a stationary lander that would be a near copy of the successful 2008 Phoenix and InSight spacecraft, but would carry an astrobiology scientific payload, including a drill to sample ice-cemented ground in the northern plains to conduct a search for biosignatures of current or past life on Mars.
  The science goals for Icebreaker Life focus on sampling ice-cemented ground for its potential to preserve and protect biomolecules or biosignatures.
  Icebreaker Life was not selected during the 2015 competition at the Discovery Program, losing out to the Psyche and Lucy missions. It will be proposed again in 2019 for a potential launch in 2026.
context_section_description: Icebreaker Life would carry a rotary-percussive drill and the proposed scientific instruments have already been tested in relevant analogue environments and on Mars.
  Signs Of LIfe Detector (SOLID) instrument can detect whole cells,  specific complex organic molecules, and polymers via fluorescence immunoassays. Using a single Life-Detection Chip (LDCHIP) measuring a few square centimeters, SOLID's antibody library can detect up to 300 different organic molecules. The instrument would carry 16 Life-Detection Chips.
  The Wet Chemistry Laboratory (WCL) is a powerful analytical instrument that would measure the pH, Eₕ, conductivity, and dissolved ions present in the ice-cemented ground. The WCL was used successfully on the 2007 Phoenix lander mission.
  A laser desorption mass spectrometer (LDMS) would detect and characterize a wide range of nonvolatile organic compounds. The LDMS uses a pulsed laser desorption/ionization (LDI) process, in which molecular ions are sampled directly from particulate samples at Mars ambient pressure, with no vacuum loading required. The LDMS method is not impacted by the presence of perchlorate.
  Rotary-percussive drill and a selected set of instruments. The drill penetrates 1 m (3 ft 3 in) in ice-cemented ground and the cuttings from this drill are sampled by a robotic sample handling system,
  The lander uses the Phoenix Surface Stereo Imager (SSI) for monitoring drill and sample delivery operations. It would provide important context information to estimate ice depth and also to understand any surface conditions that may affect mission operations and drill placement.
caption: Members of the "Icebreaker Life" team during drill automation testing at the University Valley, Antarctica, a Mars-analog site.
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