As Russian hopes of reviving the stranded Phobos-Grunt space probe fade, the nation's entire planetary exploration programme for the next decade hangs in limbo.
Designed to bring samples of ancient soil from the mysterious Martian moon Phobos, the spacecraft got stuck in low-Earth orbit immediately after its launch on 9 November. If all attempts to restore the contact with the probe fail, Russian scientists, and many of their colleagues abroad, would lose a unique opportunity for planetary research, for which they have been preparing for almost two decades.
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