The Beagle 2 is an inoperative British Mars lander that was transported by the European Space Agency's 2003 Mars Express mission. It was intended to conduct an astrobiology mission that would have looked for evidence of past life on Mars.
The spacecraft was successfully deployed from the Mars Express on 19 December 2003 and was scheduled to land on the surface of Mars on 25 December. ESA, however, received no communication from the lander at its expected landing time on Mars, and declared the mission lost in February 2004 after numerous attempts to contact the spacecraft were made.
The Beagle 2's fate remained a mystery until January 2015, when it was located on the surface of Mars in a series of images from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter HiRISE camera. The images showed it landed safely but two of its four solar panels failed to deploy, blocking the spacecraft's communications antenna.
The Beagle 2 is named after HMS Beagle, the ship that took the naturalist Charles Darwin on his round-the-world voyage.
Beagle 2 was conceived by a group of British academics headed by Professor Colin Pillinger of the Open University in collaboration with the University of Leicester. The project was designed and developed by several UK academics and companies. The spacecraft's name reflects its goal of searching for signs of past or present life on Mars. According to Pillinger:
"HMS Beagle was the ship that took [Charles] Darwin on his voyage around the world in the 1830s and led to our knowledge about life on Earth making a real quantum leap. We hope Beagle 2 will do the same thing for life on Mars."
A 50 by 8 kilometres (31.1 by 5.0 mi) ellipse centered on 11.53°N 90.50°E / 11.53; 90.50 at Isidis Planitia, an enormous, flat, sedimentary basin that overlies the boundary between the ancient highlands and the northern plains of Mars, was chosen as the landing site. The lander was expected to operate for about 180 days and an extended mission of up to one Martian year (687 Earth days) was thought possible. The Beagle 2 lander's objectives were to characterise the landing site geology, mineralogy, geochemistry, and oxidation state of the physical properties of the atmosphere and surface layers; collect data on Martian meteorology and climate; and search for biosignatures.
The principal investigator, Colin Pillinger, set up a consortium to design and build Beagle 2. The principal members and their initial responsibilities were:
Open University – Consortium leader & scientific experiments
University of Leicester – Project management, Mission management, Flight Operations Team, instrument management, and scientific experiments
Astrium – Main industrial partner
Martin-Baker – Entry, descent and landing system
Logica – Cruise, entry, descent and landing software
SCISYS – Ground segment and lander software
University of Wales, Aberystwyth – Robotic arm
McLaren Applied Technologies - composite materials for the solar panels
Astrium took over responsibility for program management, and Leicester assumed responsibility for mission management which involved the preparations for the operations post launch and the operations control centre.
In an effort to publicise the project and gain financial support, its designers sought and received the endorsement and participation of British artists. The mission's call-sign was composed by the band Blur, and the 'test card' (Calibration Target Plate) intended for calibrating Beagle 2's cameras and spectrometers after landing was painted by Damien Hirst.