Despite fluctuations due to lack of money in Russian space programmes, the St. Petersburg-ego Transport Research Institute prepares a traveling laboratory for Martitz soil research. The vehicle seen in the image is of the “rover” type and currently there are many types of: from 70 kilos to a ton of weight.
The mission of the vehicle is to measure soil composition, atmosphere, climate, etc. of Mars. In principle it should work on Mars in November 1996, but it cannot be ensured that they respect that deadline. Another year in October an international satellite was going to be put into orbit to analyze Martitz, but they have had difficulties.