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Planetary Projection A panel of researchers at the National Academies of Sciences say NASA needs to start work soon on a containment facility for any samples that might be brought back from Mars. NASA does not envision retrieving any samples from the Red Planet for more than a decade. But the panel says building such a facility will be very complex. It could take seven years or more create a place that Martian microbes cannot escape and where no earth-born microbes can contaminate the samples. NPR's Larry Abramson reports.

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Planetary Projection

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Planetary Projection

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A panel of researchers at the National Academies of Sciences say NASA needs to start work soon on a containment facility for any samples that might be brought back from Mars. NASA does not envision retrieving any samples from the Red Planet for more than a decade. But the panel says building such a facility will be very complex. It could take seven years or more create a place that Martian microbes cannot escape and where no earth-born microbes can contaminate the samples. NPR's Larry Abramson reports.