On February 17, 1996, Near-Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) was the first Discovery Program spacecraft to be launched and it became the first ever to orbit and land on an asteroid.
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The Mars Pathfinder mission demonstrated a low-cost method of delivering a set of science instruments and the first free-ranging rover to the surface of Mars.
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The science data returned from Lunar Prospector has enabled scientists to create detailed maps of the gravity, magnetic properties and chemical composition of the Moon's entire surface.
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The Stardust spacecraft collected interstellar dust and comet dust during a close encounter with Comet Wild 2 and returned the particles to Earth for analysis by scientists worldwide.
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The Genesis spacecraft spent two years collecting atoms of solar wind before returning them to Earth in September 2004 for detailed analysis.
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The Comet Nucleus Tour, or CONTOUR, mission was going to encounter and study two diverse comets during their periodic visits to the solar system.
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MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging) mission is a scientific investigation of the planet Mercury.

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The Deep Impact mission propelled a large copper projectile into the surface of a comet, creating a huge crater and yielding new information about the internal composition and structure of a comet.

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The Dawn mission is on its way to the oldest and most massive asteroids in our solar system, to give us a glimpse of conditions and processes at the dawn of our solar system.
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Kepler will use a unique telescope to search for Earth-size habitable planets around stars beyond our solar system.

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The Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory, or GRAIL, mission will put twin satellites into orbit around the Moon to map the Moon's interior and variations in its gravitational pull & to reconstruct its thermal history.
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ASPERA-3 (Analyzer of Space Plasma and Energetic Atoms), an instrument flying on the Mars Express spacecraft, is studying the interaction between the solar wind and the Martian atmosphere.
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The Moon Mineralogy Mapper, or M3, will fly aboard India's first deep space mission, Chandrayaan-1, and will characterize and map the mineral composition of the Moon at high resolution.
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EPOXI is an extension of the Deep Impact mission that will search for planets around other stars and observe a new comet.

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The Stardust New Exploration of Tempel 1, or NExT, mission will use the Stardust spacecraft to revisit comet Tempel 1, the target of the Deep Impact mission.
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