other
Larger Martian moon and MMX's landing and sampling target, with extremely low surface gravity; also floated by JAXA as a possible 'natural space station'.
No evidence-backed relationships are recorded.
Work presented at the European Geosciences Union assembly in Vienna models whether compressed rock sits beneath Phobos' largest crater, part of an effort to read the little moon's interior before Japan's MMX mission goes there to sample it.
Reality
Isabel Herreros and Sebastien Charnoz have modelled how self-gravity, Martian tides and rotation move loose material across Phobos, because on a moon that small a downhill slope does not predict which way regolith goes.
Reality
The first paper built on ESA Hera's Deimos flyby argues a single roughly 320-metre impactor did both jobs, and that the moon is porous and fragile. JAXA's MMX inherits that finding.
Reality
About a hundred SPH runs at the University of Bern converge on a single non-destructive strike as the source of Deimos's south-polar depression and its global regolith. The surface is ejecta, and it is weak.
Reality
JAXA showed the MMX spacecraft to reporters ahead of a launch it will only place in "the coming months". China's Tianwen-3 is aiming to bring Mars material back around 2031, possibly sooner.
Reality