NASA will investigate two new approaches to bring its Mars samples to Earth through a mission proposal that is less expensive and technically complicated. The space agency will flesh out options that could either involve using a commercial lander,

NASA hopes a revised plan will get Mars samples back to Earth faster and cost less than the agency's original plan.

NASA is pitching a cheaper and quicker way of getting rocks and soil back from Mars. Administrator Bill Nelson presented two options on Tuesday, less than two weeks before stepping down as NASA's chief.

The Mars Sample Return mission has been ranked as the highest priority by planetary scientists, who hope to find signs of ancient life on Mars.

The Perseverance rover has been collecting Martian rock samples since 2021, but NASA is still figuring out how to bring them back to Earth.

NASA announced Tuesday it had narrowed down to two options the reworked Mars Sample Return mission aiming for a cheaper and quicker completion than the version that was killed last year. One would be to use a version of the sky crane system that was used to land both the Mars rovers Perseverance and Curiosity safely on the Martian surface.

NASA has arrived at two ways of returning samples collected on Mars to Earth. Now, the agency will test the options to see if the cache can make it back in the 2030s.

The space agency will provide a broadcast update on the marquee mission that is intended to recover samples of Martian rock for study on Earth.

NASA has unveiled two revamped plans to bring Mars samples to Earth in the 2030s, reducing costs by nearly half from its initial $11 billion proposal while expediting the timeline.