ExoMars Mission in Danger: ESA Lose NASA Partnership

NASA may be compelled to bow out of the European Space Agency-led ExoMars missions, which aim to launch an orbiter and a rover to the Red Planet, if the budget for the next fiscal year forces deep cuts to its planetary science programs.

Experts say that if reports that President Barack Obama's budget request will allocate $1.2 billion to the program, compared with the $1.5 billion that planetary science received in fiscal year 2012 are true, the program will suffer serious cuts.

The 20 percent cut would make it tougher for the space agency to tackle ambitious exploration projects, including ExoMars.

The ExoMars mission would launch the Trace Gas Orbiter toward the Red Planet in 2016 and a robotic rover, which will carry a sizable drill that will allow it to sample subterranean soils, in 2018.

It was formally initiated in Europe in 2005 and ESA has already spent around 200 million euros on technology development.