BRITAIN: Beagle 2 is the latest in a long line of spacecraft sent to Mars, most of which have failed in their missions. They include:
1960-1964: The Soviet Union launches a series of six probes to Mars including one lander. They all fail.
1965: Nasa's Mariner 4 spacecraft flies past Mars after the failure of Mariner 3, and sends back 22 images.
1969: Mariner 6 and 7 fly past Mars, returning more than 100 pictures and analysing the atmosphere and surface. But there are two more Soviet failures. Mars 1969A and 1969B both blow up on take-off.
1971: Mariner 8 falls into the Atlantic, but Mariner 9 becomes the first probe to orbit Mars. The Soviet Cosmos 419 Mars probe never leaves Earth orbit.
Two Soviet landers equipped with small rovers reach Mars but fail to complete their missions. Mars 2 crash-lands while Mars 3 ceases transmissions 20 seconds after landing. Of the landers, Mars 6 crashes on to Mars and Mars 7 misses the planet altogether.
1976: Nasa's Viking 1 and 2 are the first spacecraft to land successfully on Mars. They are designed to search for life, but leave scientists disappointed. Mars appears to be a cold, dry, dead planet. Interest in Mars wanes after the Viking mission.
1996: The Russian Mars 96 probe never leaves Earth orbit to start its journey to Mars, and crashes into the Pacific Ocean.
1997: Mars Global Surveyor proves highly successful. So far, it has collected 120,000 images and found evidence of water beneath the Martian surface.
1999: Nasa's Mars Climate Orbiter spacecraft is lost as a result of navigation error due to confusion over metric and imperial measurements.