Stardust and Genesis: planetary protection report to COSPAR

Stardust and Genesis are the first robotic missions that will return extraterrestrial samples to the Earth. (The Apollo astronauts returned samples of the Moon, of course.) Genesis will sample solar wind particles, and Stardust will return a sample of comet "dust." Stardust was launched February 7, 1999, successfully flew through the cloud of dust that surrounds the nucleus of comet Wild-2 in January 2004, and will return the sample to Earth in 2006. Genesis was launched August 8, 2001 and headed toward an orbit around L1 to collect particles of the solar wind. Genesis will return the samples to Earth in September 2004. Both of these United States projects are operating under the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's planetary protection regulations. The PP categorization of both missions is category V (i.e. sample return) with unrestricted Earth return and with category II requirements for Stardust and with category I requirements for Genesis, for the outbound mission leg. The supporting arguments for these characterizations will be reviewed. The implications are that comets do not need to be protected on a fly-by mission. Genesis does not encounter an extraterrestrial solar system object. Neither mission has any planetary protection implementation or requirements for the Earth return leg, as well. The samples are presumptively not a hazard.