A private company will build and launch NASA's next Mars orbiter in 2028 — and it's not SpaceX

NASA has announced a new commercial partnership for the next satellite headed to the Red Planet. California-based Relativity Space will design, build and launch the spacecraft that carries NASA's Aeolus instrument suite to orbit around Mars , where the probe will be the first to provide daily measurements of the planet's global environment. Aeolus will collect data on Martian dust and cloud cover, winds and temperatures, according to a NASA release. "Public-private partnerships like this are a force multiplier for science," NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said in a statement on Wednesday (June 17). The newly announced relationship, and others between NASA and private industry, is designed to allow the agency to concentrate its resources on important science discovery. "By pairing NASA’s world‑class instruments with commercial innovation and investment, we can deliver more science, more often, and reduce the time it takes to get essential data into the hands of researchers preparing for future human missions to Mars ," Isaacman said. Aeolus consists of four instruments, designed to work in tandem to create a complete picture of the Martian atmosphere and its behavior. In addition to refining scientific models for the Martian environment, NASA plans to use the data to reduce risks to future robotic and crewed missions landing on Mars' surface . …