MAVEN

On November 18, 2013 MAVEN was successfully launched aboard an Atlas V launch vehicle.
Following the first engine burn of the Centaur second stage, the vehicle coasted in low-Earth orbit for 27 minutes before a second Centaur burn of five minutes to insert it into a heliocentric Mars transit orbit.
The plan is for MAVEN to be inserted into an areocentric elliptic orbit around Mars, 6,200 km (3,900 mi) by 150 km (93 mi) above the planet's surface, on September 22, 2014.

MAVEN-Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) is a space probe designed to study the Martian atmosphere while orbiting Mars. Mission goals include determining how the Martian atmosphere and water, presumed to have once been substantial, were lost over time.

Instrument include
MAVEN will study Mars' upper atmosphere and its interactions with the solar wind. Its instruments will measure characteristics of Mars' atmospheric gases, upper atmosphere, and ionosphere, and the solar wind. MAVEN will perform measurements from a highly elliptical orbit over a period of one Earth year, with five "deep dips" at 150 km (93 mi) minimum altitude to sample the upper atmosphere. The University of Colorado Boulder, University of California, Berkeley, and Goddard Space Flight Center each built a suite of instruments for the spacecraft, and they include:
Particles and Field (P&F) Package
Built by the University of California, Berkeley Space Sciences Laboratory.
Solar Wind Electron Analyzer (SWEA) - measures solar wind and ionosphere electrons
Solar Wind Ion Analyzer (SWIA) - measures solar wind and magnetosheath ion density and velocity
SupraThermal And Thermal Ion Composition (STATIC) - measures thermal ions to moderate-energy escaping ions
Solar Energetic Particle (SEP) - determines the impact of SEPs on the upper atmosphere
Langmuir Probe and Waves (LPW) - determines ionosphere properties and wave heating of escaping ions and solar extreme ultraviolet (EUV) input to atmosphere
Magnetometer (MAG) - measures interplanetary solar wind and ionosphere magnetic fields[26]
Remote Sensing (RS) Package
Built by the University of Colorado Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics.
Imaging Ultraviolet Spectrometer (IUVS) - measures global characteristics of the upper atmosphere and ionosphere
Neutral Gas and Ion Mass Spectrometer (NGIMS) Package
Built by Goddard Space Flight Center
Measures the composition and isotopes of neutral gases and ions
Government shutdown: While it effect other program
On October 1, 2013, only nine weeks before launch, a government shutdown caused suspension of work for two days and initially threatened to force a 26-month postponement of the mission. With the spacecraft nominally scheduled to launch on November 18, a delay beyond December 7 would have caused MAVEN to miss the launch window as Mars moves too far out of alignment with the Earth. However, two days later, a public announcement was made that NASA had deemed the 2013 MAVEN launch so essential to ensuring future communication with current NASA assets on Mars—namely the Opportunity and Curiosity rovers—that emergency funding was authorized to restart spacecraft processing in preparation for an on-time launch.
Objectives
Features on Mars that resemble dry riverbeds and the discovery of minerals that form in the presence of water indicate that Mars once had a thicker atmosphere and was warm enough for liquid water to flow on the surface. Scientists suspect that over millions of years, the planet’s core cooled and its magnetic field decayed, allowing the solar wind to sweep away ninety-nine percent of the atmosphere and thus most of its water and volatile compounds.
MAVEN is intended to determine the history of the loss of atmospheric gases to space so that answers about Martian climate evolution will emerge. From its measurements of how quickly the atmosphere escapes into space and the relevant processes, scientists will infer how the planet's atmosphere evolved. The MAVEN mission has four primary scientific objectives:
Determine the role that loss of volatiles to space from the Martian atmosphere has played through time.
Determine the current state of the upper atmosphere, ionosphere, and interactions with the solar wind.
Determine the current rates of escape of neutral gases and ions to space and the processes controlling them.
Determine the ratios of stable isotopes in the Martian atmosphere.
MAVEN is expected to reach Mars in September 2014. By then, the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument suite on board the Curiosity rover will have made similar surface measurements from Gale crater, which will help guide the interpretation of MAVEN's upper atmosphere measurements. MAVEN's measurements will also provide additional scientific context with which to test models for current methane formation in Mars.