British experts have put on display a robot lander that could settle one of the most pressing questions in space science today: whether life, or the potential for it, exists on Mars. The probe, Beagle 2, will be placed aboard a European Space Agency (ESA) spacecraft, Mars Express, which is scheduled to blast off from Russia’s Baikonur launchpad in Kazakhstan next May 23. If all goes well, exactly one year from now the mother ship will drop off its tiny golden baby as it finally nears the Red Planet.