Fraunhofer Representative Office Beijing
Miniaturized laser systems to seek out traces of life in space

© Fraunhofer IOF

Was there life on Mars? This is the question that the European Space Agency (ESA) is setting out to answer with its ExoMars mission. The mission, in which Russia is a participant, is scheduled to launch this fall, although recent political developments have raised questions as to whether this will be possible. Part of the mission is an exciting analytical system that was designed to operate in space and was created as part of the research work conducted at the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Optics and Precision Engineering IOF. The Jena-based researchers developed the miniaturized laser module for the ExoMars Rover's mobile laboratory. The institute will present this Raman spectrometer, which is fitted with a diode-pumped solid-state laser and is the size of a 50-cent coin, at the LASER World of Photonics in Munich from April 26 to 29.


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