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NASA canceled its plan to bring samples of rock from Mars back to Earth.
The Perseverance rover has been traversing the surface of the Red Planet since 2021, gathering and analyzing samples, but it is just the first of two stages.
A later, as-yet unscheduled mission was intended to return the sealed specimens to Earth.
But that is a much more complex operation than the outward journey and was expected to cost $11 billion by its eventual completion around 2040.
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The White House has long been skeptical, and Congress’ new spending bill “effectively signals the end” of the plan, Science reported.
In 2024, Perseverance discovered rocks that some scientists said showed “leopard spots” similar to those left by microbes on Earth.
